Egalitarian Developmentalism, Communist Mobilization, and the Question of Caste in Kerala State, India

Abstract

The article critiques the “Kerala model,” which holds up Kerala State, India, as a model that may be emulated by other developing countries, on account of its remarkable advances in social development. The dominant left in Kerala has often claimed credit for such achievements, leading to its glorification as a model for social democracy. This uncritical adoration, which has acquired the status of national commonsense in Kerala, has reduced marginalized people in Kerala, particularly the lower-caste Dalits and tribals, to a state of abjection. The present effort seeks to show how the marginalization of these social groups and their confinement to governmental categories was not a historical accident, but the effect of political strategies on the left that led to their exclusion from productive resources, and of the assertion of upper-caste agency in left-led anticaste struggle.

On not being able to read or speak Malayalam: language and region in Kerala

“…I found it intriguing that no translation should be provided even in very recent editions of the book (the novel is regularly reprinted to this day), even though it is quite obvious that the vast majority of readers in Kerala are not conversant enough with the language, if at all, to be able to figure out for themselves the meaning of the slokas. 26 In fact, it turns out that the presence of recitation in Sanskrit in the text points to another powerful fulcrum in the construction of a Malayalee modernity, namely, the notion that Hindu culture, especially as expressed inside the Nair caste (remember that a Namboothiri Brahmin is openly ridiculed in Menon's novel, and not only because he does not seem to know his Sanskrit), is an intrinsic part of a prestigious image of that modernity, as pointed out by J. Devika (Devika 2010;Misra and Niranjana 2005). Namely that modernity is not supposed to be a dalit, and not even an Ezhava modernity (to name another caste that was very important during the construction of Kerala's modernity.…”

“…Namely that modernity is not supposed to be a dalit, and not even an Ezhava modernity (to name another caste that was very important during the construction of Kerala's modernity. See Kumar 1997), much less, again as noted by Devika, a Syrian Christian or a Mappila Muslim one (Devika 2010). This in spite of the fact that Kerala's Christian and Muslim minorities are, in relative terms, among the largest such minorities in the whole of India.…”

“…Misra and Niranjana (2005) have given an account of a seminar in Bangalore highlighting the intricacies of talking about regions in India, Kerala included. J Devika, a historian at the Centre for Development Studies in Trivandrum, who participated in the seminar, indicated that the trope of development and progress in Kerala's history marks out a specific and powerful reading of regional identity (see also Devika [2010]). 8 This reading was one that impressed itself on me immediately following my arrival in Kerala.…”

“…The two are closely linked, in fact: the upper class constructs are de-emphasised-i.e. there is a silence about their origins-and are then offered as the foundation for Kerala's development in the guise of the building-blocks of a common Kerala-wide identity (Devika 2010). Therefore, we could venture that, together with non-Sanskritic deities and matriliny, as well as untouchability, all rejected by Kerala's narratives of modernity, the great heterogeneity of Malayalam-a heterogeneity that is aurally apparent to this day as one travels across the length and breadth of Kerala (Malayalees from different districts can often only converse with each other with relative ease if they use the common standard language in the creation of which Menon was so important)-is firmly rejected as being definitely non-Malayalam.…”

Political violence, community and its limits in Kannur, Kerala

“…In fact, following the promulgation of the 1969 Land Reform Act, Preman's father had travelled to Alleppey and other parts of Kerala to take part in the 'land grab movement', a movement led by CPI (M) volunteers to forcibly implement the provisions of the Act-encroach on government and 11 Biographies, autobiographies and self-narratives, albeit written ones, have been an important resource for scholars of modern Kerala's political and public sphere (Devika 2006(Devika , 2010Menon 2006). For two insightful reflections on biographies and self-narratives as resources for analysing history of modern Kerala, see Arunima (2004) and Kumar (2012).…”