Only in Kerala can a politician not only get away with such a blatant comment but also be praised for it.

This is why these people have managed to ruthlessly twist a morality tale from a sacred text and turn it into exactly what it is not – an example of perverse upper caste discrimination mandated by religious and scriptural sanction. .

This is what postmodernism and dialectical materialism are capable of – they can take a point out of context and distort its original meaning so completely that black becomes white, high becomes low, and good becomes bad.

It was a brilliant move, because in one fell swoop they could now further divide castes by demonstrating that prejudice was intrinsic to Hindu texts, blaming the upper castes in shameful silence, and proving that religion was indeed the opium of the masses.

If it was Hinduism, then who needed it? Who was Vamana the cheater compared to Marx the emancipator? Das Capital prevailed over Ramayana any day, and the Vamana-Mahabali episode was proof of that. Vote for the left.

Congress did not challenge this abominable distortion because it was simply too dependent on the Christian and Muslim vote.

If someone described the Hindu as a demon, that was fine, because it fit perfectly with his own secular narrative of a fascist, majority, Hindu threat, and the alarmism he could whip up for rich electoral gain. .

What if it was at the cost of Hindu sentiments, the accumulation of insults against a god or the institutionalized defamation of the so-called upper castes?

A Brahmin was a villain, Hinduism discriminated against “lower castes” and they had the scriptures to prove it.

But they are wrong.

If our Marxist comrades are to be believed, that Onam is nothing like Hindu, it is in fact the best possible description of the true “secular” nature of Hinduism.

This is because there is hardly any overt religious iconography or symbolism in the running of this festival.

But this is also true for most “Hindu” rituals in Kerala (dating back to long before communist thought dominated the socio-cultural-religious discourse of the state).

Take Nair marriages, for example: there is no ‘homam’no expert, no elaborate rituals or sacred chants shlokasno idols present, and the ceremony ends in a flash.

The mangal sutra is tied, flowers and colored rice are thrown on the pandal by the guests, rings, garlands and bouquets of flowers are exchanged by the bride and groom, both walk around a lamp seven times, touch the feet of their elders, and that’s it.

By this yardstick, our left-wing liberal never might as well classify Hindu Malayalee marriages as non-Hindu, or even irreligious.

This utter nonsense, which they so successfully applied to Onam, stems from two flaws and two deceptive and timely maneuvers:

First, they forget that the taali — the small heart-shaped pendant on the mangal sutra – is obligatorily taken to a temple to be blessed in the sanctum sanctorum before marriage.

Indeed, some families follow the practice that the groom ties the mangal sutra around the bride’s neck in a temple (usually near the wedding hall), then making separate entrances into the auditorium.

Second, the path of Kerala has always been one of severe minimalism. People dress simply, usually in white, ostentation is frowned upon, and religious icons are mostly found in the puja hall.

Traditional home decor usually consists of brass lamps, mirrors, Rama Varma prints, a apsara in a tribhanga pose, intricate woodwork and the ubiquitous grandfather clock.

Indeed, the most sacred place in any old house, where the evening lamp is lit, is a simple tulsi shrub growing in the yard.

This absence of overt and direct Hindu symbolism is why it was so easy for the left to boldly appropriate an entire festival, and not only label it secular, but label it non-Hindu as well.

Third, making Onam irreligious, or non-Hindu, allows our Marxist brethren to participate in Onam festivities without being accused of committing the ultimate Marxist sin – the ideological deviance of endorsing or legitimizing meaningless superstitious practices.

Fourth, distorting the true meaning of Onam and the Mahabali legend, also serves a convenient socio-political purpose, because now this festival can be used as the perfect bonding agent to link communities culturally.

A Malayalee festival with a new Malayalee legend for all Malayalees to celebrate happily, without the deterrent stigma of a pagan faith, while simultaneously reinforcing the evil nature of the upper castes, is also extremely helpful in shaping a secular Malayalee identity and ” progressive”.

This is how, and why, our traditions have been successfully attacked and eroded; and we didn’t even realize what was happening.

Yet the serial mutilation of Onam is only a metaphor for the blows that our customs and practices have also suffered in the rest of the subcontinent, because the modus operandi is always the same, everywhere.

Thus, in essence, the interpretation Karva Chauth as a repugnant and patriarchal practice, or viewing Holi as nothing more than an excuse for men to assault women, is part of the same strategy.

India has, of course, woke up and these malicious efforts are fiercely contested as the subcontinent reclaims its civilizational ethos, but there is still a long way to go before the damage is fully undone.

In this interim, we can only imagine how illusory satisfying it must be for the children of Marx and Nietzsche to think that God died in his own country.

Happy Onam.