A walk with Maya Krishnan unveils you the present state of Kerala which is in a crazy run to grab the super powers of the so-called development. She ushers you to the dark harems of the Malayali mindset where they buried their once adored values during that blind whiz.

I have been watching the legendary Trichur pooram for the last 16 years. I used to get away out of all my commitments to be one with Thrissur Pooram.   But this time I could see a rare sight which made me stand agape for a while and return to normalcy within minutes. While the glorious “kudamatam’ was being staged, the usual sight will be of the zealous mass howling boisterously over the rapidly changing myriad colored parasols. But this time when I was scurrying towards the Southern gate of Sri Vadakunnatha temple, I saw a lot of people including foreigners were retreating from the site. The Kudamatam ceremony has started just 5 minutes before. I got amazed, and I asked some why. They replied “ho, sweating to death..” I saw men coming out of the mass were fully drenched in sweat making one fagged out. It was then about 6 p.m. usually a lovely dusk to enjoy. So I wondered over the Madhothil varavu which is being performed at 12 noon. Somebody told me, people were comparatively less. If present, dehydrated, either falling down or leaving back soon. You might have seen (in TV) the tusker Ayyappan falling down of fatigue when the Ilanjitharamelam was at its peak.

The temperature in Trichur town is 38-40 degree Celsius. Kerala is underlining what the scientists predicted about the status of their land in global warming.

A  Malayali family.com

Kerala becomes a ‘mini gulf’. Two decades back the very word ‘gulf’ was equaled to richness and luxury and those who aspire for it and those who want to get out of the vortex of financial crisis vie to get in there. But now, things have got a sea change. Come to Kerala – I will show you Biharis working in the agricultural (?) fields, all Hindi speaking people in the countless construction sites, Telugu people working  in the courtyards, Tamilians in the house-hold works. Then you will ask where Malayli is? Come with me – I will show you where they are.

In the dawns, you can see the forty plus males driving their cars either to any play ground or to a gymnasium. In the play grounds there are innumerable organizations (not new in Kerala) of ‘walkers’. The specific and unique feature of the members is pot bellied and/ or diabetic. As per doctor’s advice, they come here to jog in the ground at the peep of the day. Another group taking a turkey towel with Bermudas goes straight to a gymnasium mainly for panting over the treadmill.

In the next scene we see the returning of the royals in groups and waving good-bye only to part into one’s own home. At home – the housewife dart hither-thither in the kitchen cursing the Tamil maid for this and that, scolding kids for watching TV, preparing break fast. Kerala’s own break fast numbers like Puutu, Ada, Idly,Dosa,Appam etc were kicked upstairs for noodles, pasta, pizza and kellogs. Father takes the breakfast along with the hot newspaper, children enjoy it without knowing the capacity of their belly along with cartoon network, mother most probably skip it as it is too late for her to go to office.

Next is again an outdoor shot. Every one comes out of home in a hurry, get into the car or scooter. Meanwhile school bus comes and picks the kids up from the very gate itself so that they need not walk even a step. Husband and wife go to the office in their vehicles.

Evening about 4.30 p.m. School bus comes in the frame and drops the children at the gate. They rush into where the busk-toothed maid would have made a glass of complan . They sip it and search in the shelf for any bakery item stuffed in a tin, find it, and walk straight to the TV until the mother enters the frame. As soon as she gets in she starts to shower rebukes at them for not going to the tuition or violin class and the most obedient kids start slowly for the same. At about 8’o clock the father comes in fixing the mobile phone in one ear. After removing the official dress, he sits in a chair with a laptop. He howls and bursts through the phone looking into the laptop and sometimes can be seen pleading yielding like a brooding pup.

Night.– Supper is ready and the mother or maid calls every one and they come one by one to the table from their own caves and taking their own plates goes to the TV and takes the food without even looking into the plate. Mother prepares her dressing materials for the next day, father still in the lap top, children go to bed late night.

The  Draught Shots

Okay, I think you have enjoyed the documentary show of an average Malayali family. Next, I usher you to the land of Kerala, better known to you as God’s own country.Once nostalgic to every non resident Malayali, the land of hills, the land of emerald green fields are now in the wide shot seen exposed to the onslaught of weather vagaries.

You can see the government, the multitude of political parties even the media celebrating the ‘great draught’. This is the harvest season for the water distributors who supply water in lorry tankers and plastic bottles. ‘Sun burn’ was a mere word in the lexicon for the Malyali but now in Palakkad, Kannur and in Trichur humans die of sun burns. You can see the dried up paddy fields, charred rubber and pepper yards, headless coconut trees along the way sides. See, the media men taking snaps of the draught shots as if it is a bizarre wonder, unprecedented.

Do you know, we had 44 rich rivers undefiled with crystal clear water to drench and nurture the stem and meristem of the natives in plenty? Where are they now? You can see the half-dead Nila (Bharatappuzha) with thickets grown on her bosom, the Pampa river, used to sanctify the Ayyappa devotees now filled with plastic and human wastes, lie flat after a gang-bang.

The number of rainy days comes down perilously leaving back some promising political aspirants to beseech for their vote bank with all piss and wind. Now, you may ask, what all are the precautionary measures and procedures the government and the ‘democratically powered public’ have taken so far against this hazard which is not an unexpected one?

The Element called Water

Yes, I.m coming to that point. WE all are seriously discussing with those matters. Meanwhile the significant argument is over the amount of the relief fund granted by the Central Government. We need to irrigate the draught-affected agricultural land, we need to provide drinking water to the remote villages,– for all these to implement, a lot of plumbing works have to be done by cutting across the tarred roads and as such we need to utilize the relief fund. When it is getting shared by the Panchayats, no one of should ever stay back to get the benefit at its maximum. Hence the dispute.

You want to know more of it authentically? Come to our honorable Assembly. See the heated discussions going on there by our elected members. These ‘sound and fury’ signifies nothing but their indebtedness towards their voters in Kerala – Listen to it.. They are talking about the water ‘stolen’ by the Tamil Nadu from ‘our’ Mullaperiyar Dam. Don’t ask me ‘for whom they steal the water.’ These are our internal affairs.

Why do you pull me back to the old stinking anecdotes? Yes, For Tamilians, Kannadigas, and for Telugu people, water has been a ‘political issue’ since their birth. This is because they have been leading a life which is closely twined to the biodiversity in which they sustain. So it is their duty, their responsibility my friend, to make use of that water for agricultural purpose and feed the Keralites with the vegetables they cultivate out of this water usage, to provide Keralites with plenty of milk to boos t their cartoon kids by the cows they rear up, to help the Keralites to organize ‘mega feasts’ with the rice they raise in their vast paddy fields. So they should be submissive to the element called water. But why should WE bother it?

Yes, what you said is true. Once we were an agrarian community. But now we are on the developing arena of the globe, yaar. We need to mould plenty of professionals to work in U.S. and U.K. to offer our forefathers with dollars and pounds. But don’ think that we have left the soil apparently. We do plant rubber trees in our rich mountain slopes. When other trees wither their leaves in the winter so as to minimize the water content, this rubber tree might not do that. But we keep the greenery with it. We have a lot more cash crops also. Don’t be foolish. In this scorching sun and in the unpredictable climate why do we put ourselves in the marshy paddy fields? While no one is available to climb up a coconut tree, why should we instigate over a coconut yard? We get enough coconuts from Tamil Nadu.

River’s Tale/ Reverse Tail

What do you say – the water from the Western Ghats are flowing and coming through the Tamil forests? So what? Anyways, we have lost most of our forests. Don’t be silly. All these are part of urbanization that means development. Demolishing the hills is also a subdivision in that agenda. If Tamil Nadu lets the river as such to us, we will definitely construct a hydro-electric project across it. You know, every year we are suffering and stifling in the power cuts and load-shedding. Some silly so-called intellectuals howl and hoot against it. But who cares? We need a lot of hydro-electric projects as we solely depend on electricity to move forward – forward to the pinnacle of the globe.

Do you know my friend, that river is big enough to jazz around. We can have some water- theme-parks so that our children can have a get away from the TV apparitions. Still balance of water is there, we will lend a ‘thumbs up’ to a Coca cola or Pepsi company. See, our youngsters are obsessed with those soft drinks. Without those chilling bubbling drinks how can they ride long in this hot climate?

Village visions

Now let us go to the villages, of whom several emotional poets have scribbled a lot. See, the way development comes in. Now nobody can say that India is an under developed or developing country. It is a fully developed nation now. Look around, don’t you see the sky-kissing apartments sprouted on the bosoms of the dried-up paddy fields? Who the hell are you to talk about the land mafia and the laws against land filling? There is another clause in it that if a paddy field lay uncultivated for more than 5 years that can be sold out or can be used for cultivating other cash crops. The land owners don’t get anyone to work in the fields. And they never like to make their own children a link in the hereditary chain of farmers. See how modestly these apartments are being built here? See their glass walls. Scientists say that the low frequency radiations when becomes hot it won’t get out of the room through the glass. So naturally it will be hotter inside and these types of buildings are suitable only in the places having cold climate. But we have fixed split Air Conditioners even inside the bathrooms. Don’t you think that it can’t be stand abreast with those of Switzerland and Paris?

Don’t give your ear to those pandemoniums? Those ear-bashers are talking about sand mafia. My dear friend, after all what is this sand? It is nothing but a raw ingredient for the concrete mixture, and it is available only from the river bed. So we are mining it out to build up such multiplexes with all the luxuries for which we have been yearned for years.

You can find no more Keralites standing agape at the sky-high glass chalets in the foreign countries. While Corporates put their fingers in our bowl we too began to fan ourselves with the neck-tie and suiting which they once thought not suited to the brown skins!!!

The Express that is Kerala

Walk along my friend. Are you scared of the neck-breaking plies of vehicles on the road? See, now every Malayali family owns at least one car or motor bike. But our roads are as usual narrow to suit only to the bullock carts. But see, we are up and up with a plan of an Express Highway. We will make that dream come true even if it needs a vertical split of the State geographically, demolishing all the way-ward hindrances of hills and tufts. It may create bottomless hollows of granite quarries. Who cares? We need Four-lines to have a flawless ride.

Sweating? This year also we did not get enough rain. But that is a blessing in another thought. If a rain hits Kerala, these road sides would no longer be walkable. All drainages will be inundated and the dirty stinky water will spread the whole area causing all kinds of epidemics. We Keralites love this hot climate. We have air conditioned cars and air conditioned homes and offices. So why should we welcome a RAIN of calamities?

Related posts:

1. Reporting a Thrissur Pooram
2. Garnishing the Cultural Capital Trichur
3. HOLI can be HOLY
4. IN THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE, BIHAR
5. Student remembered by FOPIK – Federation of Parents in Kerala