The political significance of Nilakkal.

Today I learnt that Nilakkal, a place near the foothills of sabarimala, has a more prominent history than what most people have known. The village is known as the place for RSS backed religious groups to gather and group. It sits right on the path towards the hillock, which means anyone trekking up the hill can be checked there. I had wondered why is this place chosen for the conflict , instead of a place further downhill ? And I found the true answer only recently.

It seems this place has always been the site for religion driven conflict. At least from 1983. That year a stone cross was found at Nilakkal, on land owned by the Kerala Farming Corporation, barely 200 metres from the Shiva temple.The next day, followers of Mathew Anthiyakulam, vicar of the nearby Pamba Valley Church, arrived at the spot singing devotional songs. Claiming the cross was a remnant of the ancient church established by St Thomas, they built a thatched shed over it and started holding daily prayers. Soon after, the Kerala Catholic Congress, an organisation of the laity, set up a Nilakkal Action Council to prepare for the construction of a church at the site. On the council’s request, the state’s Congress government allotted it one hectare (2.4 acres) of land close to the temple for the church construction.

Christians believed that St Thomas, one of Jesus Christ's 12 disciples, had travelled to Kerala and established 7 churches, and that one of them was at Nilakkal. The hindus who traditionally visited the temples at Nilakkal saw this as a conspiracy, and convened their own agitation against the 'christian takeover'. They claimed there was no proof of St Thomas’s visit to India or of his having established churches. They demanded the removal of the cross, alleging it was of recent origin and had been planted on 'Hindu holy land'.

The main leader of this agitation was a certain Mr Kummanam Rajasekharan, who was then a Vishwa Hindu Parishad leader.Rajashekaran accused the government of sacrificing the interests of Hindus to get Christian votes.

Things quickly took a violent turn, which lasted months. Even K Karunakaran, who was the chief minister, was not spared.

Karunakaran was in the habit of praying at the Sri Krishna Temple in Guruvayur on the first day of the Malayalam months. As usual, he reached the temple on May 15, 1983, for morning prayers. As soon as he entered the temple, a huge gathering of people affiliated to the then Sangh Parivar platform Hindu Aikyavedi prevented him from offering prayers. They accused Karunakaran of illegally handing over land holy to the Hindus at Nilakkal for the construction of a church.

The developments in Nilakkal led to a massive Hindu mobilisation. Violating prohibitory orders, the RSS organised a protest march in Thiruvananthapuram. More than 1,000 of its workers and those of the Hindu Munnanireligious group were arrested from across the state for unleashing violence. In Nilakkal, RSS and Hindu Munnani activists dismantled the thatched shed and manhandled Christians. Tensions soared after Hindu Munnani activist Koorambala Chandran Pillai died weeks after being injured in a police lathicharge.

On June 4, 1983, Nilakkal witnessed an intense hour-long battle as the police tried to disperse a throng of rock-throwing VHP activists with batons and teargas. The clash left 50 injured while 30 protestors, included nine ascetics, were arrested. The VHP said they would not allow a church anywhere near the temple or even within range of the 18 hills surrounding the Sabarimala shrine, asserting that the area belonged to Hindus alone.

On July 16, 1983, hundreds of VHP workers gathered again in Nilakkal for a protest meeting with night-long prayers and rituals. Prominent religious figures such as Vidyananda Saraswathi and Sathyananda Saraswati addressed the crowd.

The next day, Hindu temples across Kerala flew black pennants to protest the church construction plan. In the following days, thousands of Hindus donning black cloths over their mouths and on their hands marched on the streets of all the major towns and cities of Kerala, condemning the police action and arrest of holy men in Nilakkal.

Coinciding with the protests in Nilakkal, two Catholic churches were attacked with homemade bombs, 15 state transport busses were vandalised and 28 protestors arrested.

The violence prompted the government to ban the activities of the Hindu Unity Action Council.

Peace was finally restored after Gandhian MP Manmadhan held discussions with both sides. A meeting of Kerala bishops was held and it was decided that the cross would be relocated to a place agreed upon by both action councils. The church would be built at this spot 4 km south-west of the temple, well outside the area the Hindu side identified as Ayyappa’s sacred grove. The spot where the cross was originally found is now part of a parking lot for pilgrims to Sabarimala.

A small church dedicated to St Thomas now stands in Angamoozhy, the spot that was agreed upon all those years ago. Very few of those who visit it know of its history or its role in what may well be the largest communal flare-up in Kerala’s history.

What makes this church different from others is that it follows the principle of ecumenism, which promotes unity among the various Christian churches. Kerala’s Christian community comprises numerous denominations, prominent among them being the Syrian Catholic, Orthodox, Marthoma and Jacobite churches.

The Sangh Parivar began the process to communalise Kerala in 1983 by hipping up a frenzy against the plan to construct a small church close to the Mahadeva temple in Nilakkal. In a way, Nilakkal is a milestone in the Sangh Parivar’s growth in Kerala.

So you see, Nilakkal has been the centrepoint of violent history in the past, and therefore continues to be the first place supporters of RSS would congregate at for their future political stands.

Choker Delhi

November. Winter is coming. And what better indicator of this than the worsening Air Quality Index of Delhi ? It is that time of the year again, when the animals trying to survive in India's capital city have to struggle more to breath in the thick, smog layered atmosphere, which the citizens themselves helped destroy.

It is painful just reading the news in the air. Air quality generally deteriorates as winter sets in because of a combination of agricultural crop burning in the nearby states of Punjab and Haryana, dust from roads and construction sites, industry, coal power plants and vehicular emissions. The level of carcinogenic pollutants, which increases risk of stroke, heart disease and lung cancer, in New Delhi’s air was almost six times the reading in Beijing, where air quality has seen a considerable improvement over the past years.

India, home to 10 cities with the world’s worst air quality, has been struggling to contain this annual catastrophe that killed an estimated 1.24 million citizens in 2017. Governments have pledged millions of dollars and deployed extra teams to enforce existing laws that include a ban on farmers burning stubble after harvest. But the sheer size of India makes rapid progress difficult.

For the past few years, farm stubble burning — a tradition to clear fields after harvest for the new sowing season — along with festive firecrackers, vehicular and construction emissions have been turning the South Asian nation’s air deadly around October-November. The huge number of crackers burst to celebrate the hindu festival of diwali in october makes matters worse. One of the many ways religion helps kill people.

The government, or at least its PR wing, is back in action planning 'plans' to control the pollution. And this is coming from the same people who have tried to 'correct' the slowdown in the nation’s economy for months now.

What a fascinating time to live in Delhi.

Why no protests ?

Its been months now, since the Indian media first started reporting of an apparent slowdown in the country's economy. After bigger media houses, economists and investors picked up and magnified the story, external rating agencies have downgraded the country's prospects. Nobel prize winning laureates double checked, and confirmed. Banks are shutting down, and companies are downsizing.

After all of this, the question that is troubling me is: why isn't anyone protesting ?

In a country known to protest the slightest increase in fuel prices, it is ironical that Indians have not put forward an organized effort to call the government's bluff. All those people now unemployed, where are their protests ? The industries affected, why are their stocks still up ?

The severe lack of protests in the world's largest democracy is chilling. There is no validation for the reported slowdown. Has this democracy lost its voice ?

USA's legal immigration problem.

We, the whole world has known for decades that US of A has always had a problem with its legal immigration system. And this is a reason why so many people have tried, and still try, to get in illegally. But nobody has documented the problem as concisely as a British immigrant to the US, British comedian John Oliver.

As he so clearly puts it, there are very few avenues for the legal migrant to America. Even for the most qualified & skilled migrant. For the first 100 or so years, they didn't even have a legal immigration pathway, so everyone just got in illegally. But today, the only ways possible is via a family sponsored visa, or an employer sponsored one. Of course we are not counting the lottery system, because the odds of getting that are so low.

Watch on , and contemplate.

The great Indian taxpayer is an elusive creature

There is a very elusive species of creature in India. It works very hard everyday, day and night,sometimes more than 14 hours a day for its food and family. Everyday is a work day, hardly any rest. It also suffers most of modern lifestyle induced sickness. The country, draws significant growth from the hard work of this little species, and ultimately rewards it almost nothing in return.

This species is called the great Indian bustard tax-payer.

I have always known of the hard life this species lives. It does not live, it simply survives. But the data to correlate and breakdown its sad state was buried undred thousand page reports prepared from half informed forms. But recently, there was a nice article summarising its pitiful state.

The salaried income tax payer in India often feels cheated. “What are my taxes being used for," he often asks himself. The roads continue to have potholes. The traffic never ends. The public transport system never seems to expand fast enough. The healthcare system is non-existent. The legal system takes years to give a judgement. The police are corrupt, and so on.

Read on, and pass further into depression.

A few jaw droppers from this piece:

A small portion of India’s salaried population pays the bulk of its individual income tax, which gets redistributed to others and doesn’t benefit the taxpayers that much. In the process, it drives them away from the Indian state. At least, that’s the feeling going around.

“If the state’s role is predominantly redistribution, the middle class will seek—in professor Albert Hirschman’s famous terminology—to exit from the state. They will avoid or minimize paying taxes; they will cocoon themselves in gated communities; they will use diesel generators to obtain power; they will go to private hospitals and send their children to private education institutions."

About 4% of citizens who vote pay taxes, the percentage should be about 23

This last line is truly a clincher. It means the majority of people pariticipate in this democracy do not actually contribute to the country, but instead, feed on the little benefits it is able to pay out.

Individuals paying an income tax of greater than ₹1.5 lakh accounted for nearly 79% of the total tax.

If you happen to belong to this group, you might really feel that you have a good portion of the burden of the nation on your shoulders. Of course, this is good enough reason for the government to start taxing agricultural income over a certain level. Given that the bulk of the tax is paid by a small proportion of the population, there is always talk going around about doing away with the income tax at lower income levels.

But the question is can the government really afford to do this?