God Finds Place In Own Country

Two years back, if you had asked a voter in Pala about ‘love jehad’, you would have been greeted with a blank expression. It was not very much part of the political vocabulary in this neck of the woods. Pala is canonical Kottayam, a small town in this south-central district, with a slow, lilting dialect and an honest, hard-working ethic—you could also say it’s at the heart of Syrian Christian Kerala. It’s not as if communities in Kerala had only unbounded love for each other. Like elsewhere, there can be less than complimentary views on each other, mutual suspicions—and tinges of animosity. But politics here had only articulated communitarian loyalties; it never much based itself around actual antipathies. There’s a general balance of social forces here that gives Kerala its stability and even refinement—also a large social commons, so to speak, in which everyone participates. Therefore, the pathological fear of each other that defines politics in the north does not have currency here. And metaphors like love jehad, which flow such fears, never put down roots here.

And yet, there are complexities there. For one, the larger narratives of world politics have a role here. ‘Islamophobia’, in the contemporary sense, is a Western construct that feeds into and plays upon older, historical India. Kerala offers a variation on that. Since the ‘West’ is understood to be ‘Christian’, there’s a natural place for affinities in thought and understanding there. So if the world out there speaks a kind of language, it is not without resonance in Pala. As astute observers have pointed out, the very category of ‘love jehad’ was actually named in those terms, even created, from the heart of Christian Kerala. No surprise, then, to find that historical anxieties—mostly subliminal till now—have been brought to the surface by contemporary ‘northern’ politics, of which the BJP is an exemplar. Those fears can now be seen, and heard, being expressed a bit more freely amidst the Christian community in this region.

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The specific turn was imparted to things by Pala’s Kerala Congress (M) candidate, Jose K. Mani, when he expressed concern over the increasing incidents of ‘love jehad’ that apparently targets the Christian community here. With a week to go for the assembly elections, his comments came as a huge embarrassment to the CPI(M)-led Left Democratic Front (LDF), which had allied with KC(M) just last year. The CPI(M) opposes the love jehad laws brought by some BJP-ruled states—its politics is naturally based around opposing, tooth and nail, the very ideas that engendered that concept. So it was naturally in a tight spot with Mani’s remarks, just as state BJP leaders were lapping it up. And with the Kerala Catholic Bishops’ Council (KCBC) extending support to Mani, things were truly on the boil.

Yes, Mani withdrew his statement the next day, but he had by then already spoken a truth. Not about love jehad, but about the deep polarisation among minority communities along religious lines ahead of the elections here. Other parties like the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML) have waded into the controversy, so expect the political landscape of Kerala to go further down this route of religious polarization, and for it to witness many more flare-ups.

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IUML leader M.K. Muneer spoke to Outlook about the issue. The fears of the Church are baseless, he says, adding that even the Supreme Court had in a ruling refused to accord any reality to the concept of love jehad. “We spoke to the bishops and tried to allay their fears. It is not happening in Kerala or elsewhere in India,” says Muneer. But that only touches a different kind of verity—the truth is that the concept has entered the vocabulary here. The very fact that it has happened in Kerala means its social and political landscape has been coloured in a certain way—regardless of how well the BJP does.

Take the effects on the ground. The closing of ranks among Christians has led to a counter-mobilisation among the Muslim community ahead of the elections. “If the Christians are consolidating against what they suspect to be a threat to their identity, the Muslims too are insecure about the anti-Muslim policies of the central government,” observes a Calicut-based senior journalist. Observers also point out that though caste and religion play a significant role in every election, this time all the three political fronts— the CPI(M)-led LDF, the Congress-led UDF and the BJP—have fielded their candidates purely on the basis of these considerations. To woo the Muslims in northern Kerala, the CPI(M) has also changed its tactics and incorporated more Muslim names in their candidate list—even going to the extent of changing a candidate after two days of campaigning, say observers.

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Cibu Irimbinical of the KCBC, the Catholic Bishops’ Council, says he has never seen such inter-religious discord in an election before. “This is the first time I am seeing such polarisation on religious lines. Earlier too, political parties used to consult us during elections, but this time it has gone to a different level altogether. The political parties are making sure they are not contesting along party lines, along any other aspect of politics or governance, but basing it purely on religion,” he says.

For some time now, the BJP has deployed the bogey of love jehad to woo Hindu voters—in Kerala, this has been extended to Christian voters. In its election manifesto, it has even proposed a law against love jehad, similar to what Uttar Pradesh and other BJP-ruled states have. “I feel they will use the law to harass Muslims and anyone who challenges them. We should remember that they used the same ‘love jehad laws’ against the nuns who were attacked in the train at Jhansi,” says Irimbinical, referring to the March 19 incident that has the potential to sour the incipient love the Church is developing for the BJP.

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Wooing the Christian community was part of a desperate, last-ditch effort by the BJP to make inroads into Kerala, which only has a single seat in the assembly. With Kerala’s electoral demographic being split down three ways—with strong, stable Muslim and Christian populations—and with the ‘Hindu vote’ being very riven by old caste animosities between Nairs and Ezhavas, this was an opening they had been seeking out. That the BJP’s Hindutva politics is based equally around a historical fear of Christianity is a just a matter of passing irony. Of late, the Christian community, a traditional vote-base of the Congress with strong anti-Marxist sentiments, has also started reciprocating with audible shows of affinity towards the BJP after the party addressed some of the concerns voiced by the community.

Keep aside the anti-Christian sentiments you will often hear on the Hindu right. Here in Kerala, the BJP was quick to capitalise on the Churches’ displeasure over the state government’s alleged appeasement policy towards Muslims, as also with the IUML’s increasing influence within the UDF. In an interview to Outlook, BJP state president K. Surendran said the Christians are warming up to the BJP because they see the UDF and LDF as two sides of the same coin. “The Church recognises that Islamic fundamentalists are a threat to Christianity. They feel only the BJP can oppose Islamist terror,” he says.

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This works both ways, of course. It’s a complex chessboard. Some Christians may have started harbouring a certain affinity towards the BJP—on the basis of an“enemy’s enemy” logic. But there is also a wariness. And the polarisation is also helping the LDF tap into minority fears—Muslims and Christians together comprise 46 per cent of Kerala’s population (Muslims: 27 per cent, Christians: 19 per cent). The impact is being felt quite strongly also in the northern districts of Kerala, where Muslims are in majority. The LDF government’s unwavering stand against the CAA, for instance, garnered support from among the Muslim community in the recent local body elections, says Prof Akbar C. of the Malappuram government college. Many pre-poll surveys also predict a shift in Muslim votes to the LDF camp. The minorities, who used to be a core votebank of the Congress, are moving away from the party because of its dilly-dallying on soft Hindutva and the leadership crisis, say observers.

But the BJP has sensed an opportunity amidst the growing divide between the Christian and Muslim communities. That’s what propelled them to intervene on a 100-year-old property dispute between two influential factions of the Church—the Orthodox and Jacobite Syrians. It may have inflected the political vocabulary here, but its efforts have not made much headway. Church heads held several rounds of meetings with Prime Minister Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah, but not all observers are convinced about the dividends it will yield electorally. With many pre-poll surveys suggesting that the Pinarayi Vijayan government will return, a senior Kochi-based journalist says the churches may finally adopt a favourable stand towards the LDF. “People know how Christians are treated by the BJP and the RSS in northern India,” says CPI(M) leader and candidate M.B. Rajesh. The recent attack on two nuns on that train in Jhansi, Uttar Pradesh, feeds right into those fears and is likely to cast a shadow on the BJP’s hopes of garnering Christian votes. Fr Paul Thelakat, former spokesperson of the Syro-Malabar Church, for instance, is quite without doubt that the BJP and RSS were always opposed to Christianity. “In Kerala, the BJP dons a different face.  There are some in the Church who consider the Syrian Christians are ‘high castes’ converted to Christianity. The Hindutva forces are ready to concede that to woo them. They are even unaware of the plight of their brothers and sisters in the rest of the country,” he says.

Northern Kerala is in a churn, meanwhile, and commentators say that will be a factor. It’s not just that many overtly Muslim outfits are in the poll fray. The CPI(M) too is hoping to breach the IUML’s citadel, hoping to ride on CAA and similar issues, says a party leader. Dr Hameed C., a professor at Farook College, Kozhikode, doesn’t think there will be any significant erosion of Muslim League votes. “The IUML may retain its votebank, but there won’t be a total swing for the UDF like it happened during the parliamentary election,” he says.

But that’s also a real fight, unfolding right now, to harvest souls. The animus can be gauged from the words of IUML’s Muneer, who says it’s the CPI(M) that created polarisation by spreading fake narratives, with a tacit communal angle. “The CPI(M) put out the narrative that the Muslim League would end up ruling the state and that it has an upper hand in the UDF. This caused insecurity among the other communities,” he says. But the IUML may perhaps have reason to worry. The CPI(M) has succeeded in improving its relationship with Sunni Muslims. And the presence of hardline Muslim outfits like the Social Democratic Party of India (SDPI) and the Jamaat-e-Islami-backed Welfare Party of India (WPI) is expected to fragment the votes even more. They have their own arguments against the Left. For instance, the LDF government’s move to implement a 10 per cent quota for the economically weaker sections among (Hindu) forward communities has irked some Muslims. “Both the fronts have no clear stand on issues. The Left brought in economic reservations. They adopt positions only for votes,” says PFI national secretary Nasaruddin Elamaram. The conflict runs deep. Hameed Vaniyambalam, state president of WPI, even says the CPI(M)’s stand on CAA is a fake narrative. “We need an alternative anti-fascist movement,” he tells Outlook.

That leaves the Hindus. There’s of course already a readymade topic to play on those sentiments and take care of that segment. The entry of women of all ages into the Sabarimala temple is a contentious issue of such durability that it has inevitably made a comeback in this electoral landscape, polarising the air further. All the main players want Hindu community votes—even if such a category had not existed earlier in Kerala, it’s a central feature of the ongoing polarization. Hindu votes, totalling them in a way that Kerala has not done before, comprise 55 per cent. So Sabarimala is naturally part of the induced political conversations here. Both the Congress and the BJP, in their manifesto, propose a legislation to outright ban the entry of menstruating women—competing almost for a more reactionary space. The LDF government, meanwhile, has taken a careful, wary stand that consultations must be held with all stakeholders after the Supreme Court’s ruling on the review petitions.

In numbers, the Nairs and Ezhavas make up a bulk of the Hindus in Kerala. Both are crucial elements, therefore, in this game—and both are politically mobilised in a way. The Sree Narayana Dharma Paripalana (SNDP) Yogam is the main socio-political organ for the originally backward caste Ezhavas; for the Nairs, largely old feudal landlords who historically resent the land reforms the Marxists brought, the Nair Service Society (NSS) is a platform. The latter’s position is crucial for all political fronts, and ever since the Sabarimala issue flared up, it has had a bone to pick with the LDF regime. That’s of course only a lens that focalises a wider spectrum of angry light. NSS general secretary G. Sukumaran Nair tells Outlook that he will keep all the parties at equal distance. “Our issues shouldn’t be seen as political. Our demand is for banning women’s entry into Sabarimala and also reservation for older forward castes,” he says. Caste resentment is not difficult to discern in those words.

But the Nairs comprise only 15 per cent of the population. The Ezhavas, who account for 23 per cent, are no pushovers at all—they have a sizeable presence among Left cadre but the SNDP has also occasionally dallied with the BJP. Vellapally Natesan, SNDP general secretary, tells Outlook that the LDF government has done stellar work in all areas, including health and education. “We’ll help the party that helped us in crisis. The BJP won’t grow in Kerala even after 100 years because it’s a party of elite castes,” he says. The SNDP’s political outfit, the Bharath Dharma Jana Sena (BDJS), headed by his son Tushar Vellappally, is incidentally an ally of the BJP in Kerala. Natesan’s words would suggest that somebody missed a trick somewhere. But that equivocation down the line shows that Kerala knows a trick or two even in these polarised times.

A shorter, edited version of this appeared in print