Unpacking the narrative being constructed against the State

Last month, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath suggested that “the Kerala government should learn how to run hospitals from U.P.” This statement is one of the many attempts to build a hostile narrative around Kerala by the Sangh Parivar. There is, for instance, talk of Kerala’s “killing fields” while referring to killings of BJP/Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh political workers; the State’s “love jihad” and “jihadi terror” factories and their communist supporters.

Last major bastion

Why is this happening? This is because Kerala is one of the “last frontiers” for the Hindu nationalist project. RSS ideologue M.S. Golwalkar once remarked that India faced more internal than external threats, referring to Muslims, Christians and Communists. He said: “In this land Hindus have been the owners, Parsis and Jews the guests, and Muslims and Christians the dacoits.” Kerala has all three in substantial numbers, and is unique in this demographical and ideological mix.

The systematic propaganda about political killings is illustrative of the narrative. From 2000 to 2016, there were 69 political murders in Kannur district — the hotbed of clashes between Communist Party of India (Marxist) and BJP/RSS cadre. Of these, 30 were of CPI(M) workers and 31 of BJP-RSS workers. For Kerala, in 2006-17, the numbers were 50 for CPI(M) and 45 for the BJP-RSS. Yet, it is not asked how the so-called victim, which is electorally insignificant in Kerala, is able to match the “perpetrator”, which is the dominant political group that enjoys state power regularly, in this reprehensible cycle of violence. While killings of selected individuals intermittently, in which both sides are equally culpable, are termed as “anarchy”, and lead to calls for President’s Rule, three riots in BJP-ruled Haryana in three years affecting entire cities and killing nearly 70 people did not elicit the same calls.

Another sleight of hand of the misinformation campaign is to draw a false equivalence between beef lynchings and the killing of minorities/Dalits, and the killing of RSS/BJP workers, which is also portrayed as anti-Hindu. All killings are abhorrent, but innocent civilians being targeted for their caste/religion cannot be clubbed with a protracted and violent political conflict which involves workers of the two ideologies (incidentally, those killed from the CPI(M) are overwhelmingly Hindu).

The central battle for Hindu nationalism is on the terrain of culture. Hence, the relentless targeting of Malayali cultural practices like eating beef, or festivals like Onam. Kerala is the only major State where beef is not only consumed by the vast majority, but also by upper caste Hindus. Similarly, Onam, celebrating the return of Mahabali, the Asura king banished by the Brahmin Vamana, an avatar of Vishnu, is antithetical to the Brahminised religion in Hindutva. Hence, BJP president Amit Shah wished people “Vamana Jayanti” on the eve of Onam.

It is very rare for a Hindu festival to be celebrated by all religions in India. Onam becomes a secular and not Hindu festival. This again disturbs the Hindutva notions of religious homogeneity and exclusivity. Of course, while the mythology of Onam symbolised the non-Brahminical past, in present-day Kerala, it is markedly Savarna in its symbolisms, especially vegetarianism. Nevertheless, a crucial distinction is there between the upper-caste coding of Onam, which still allows some plurality because of its original intent, and the Hindutva majoritarian nationalist project with its fascist tendencies. Further, the upper caste nature of Onam is itself being challenged through non-vegetarian Onam, Dalit appropriations, etc.

Finally, there is development, which becomes another point of Kerala’s ‘othering’. Here, Hindutva is at its weakest. Mr. Adityanath’s statement is not an aberration. Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself made the egregious equation of Kerala with Somalia. While Kerala is no utopia, especially regarding caste equality, it is the only State with “high human development”, while impoverished Somalia, racked by Western imperialism, has very low human development.

Against Kerala, the government propagates Gujarat as the model for development (even if Gujarat’s HDI rank has fallen). While Mr. Modi pits one State against the nation, ironically Kerala was the first to become a “digital State,” attain “total banking”, total primary education, provide electricity to all houses, and be the third State to become open-defecation free — all of which are Mr. Modi’s pet projects. Without societies like Kerala as its “anti-national” other, Hindutva loses its raison d'être.

Nissim Mannathukkaren is Chair, International Development Studies, Dalhousie University, Canada