Deconstructing the Kerala Story

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Religion takes a back seat when it comes to ethnicity and culture for a Malayali (Kerala )Hindu. The syncretic culture, a source of malayali pride, is an amalgamation of various religious traditions accepted and accommodated by MalayaliHindus over the centuries. Unlike a segregation based on religion, the Malayalam language, Kerala cuisine, Attire,   etc. coalesce to find a common brotherhood among Malayalis as an ethnicity.  A Hindu Malayali is a distinct subspecies of his Hindu brethren from the rest of India. He/She has more in common with fellow Malayali Christian/Muslim than his/her north indian counterparts.

The movie ‘The Kerala Story’ depicts an on going narrative based on the veil of this syncretic culture. It juxtaposes the scenic beauty of Kerala vis-a-vis the underlying vicious motive of ‘Love Jihad’ propagated by ISIS loyalists. The movie has unabashedly thrown light on how the innocence and nonchalance of the accommodative Hindus are exploited by the monotheists to serve their global purpose. The unsuspecting Hindu Girls, who know the stories of their Gods but lack a philosophical understanding of Hinduism, are gullible to doubt their own religious and cultural values after listening to some silly insinuations from other religions. The Abrahamic religions are organised in uniting their fellow members for their political and economic reasons from the very beginning. Hinduism, originally known as SanatanDharma  is neither agenda driven nor business oriented. It does not believe in capturing and converting people to create a certain social order for political and economic purposes. Hinduism does believe in multifarious Gods and also acknowledges the possibility of Gods from other cultures. This believe and acknowledgement has been the reason for a Hindu’s tolerance to accommodate other faiths into their land.

The movie has aptly taken Kerala as a sample to show case the tragedy of Hindu Girls who fall prey to agenda driven love business because of the fertile secular atmosphere and political empathy to minorities as a part of appeasement policy. As depicted in the movie, the northern districts of Kerala are infamous for fundamentalists, and people from central and southern Kerala seldom have any clue about their nature. The movies issues a precautionary note for Hindu girls to protect themselves from such evil traps in the name of love- for love is for what you are and not for what you would become. Finally, the snare of Malayali Pride captures the Hindus by giving them a status of an onlooker in their own field while the fruits of their harvest are taken away by some migratory birds.