In 2007, a year after I returned from the USA, I had an invitation to inaugurate a major function in a college in Thodupuzha, Kerala. At that time I was in Palaruvi Waterfalls, near Aryankavu, about 4 hours journey by car from Thodupuzha. When I started driving on the day of a strike I was warned of the dangers as the whole of Kerala was on a general strike declared by a major political party. I drove with my wife. The road was clear as we were practically the only ones on the road. In some places I saw some curious police officers looking at us in dismay. On August 1, 2012, I drove from my Ashram near Munnar to Kottayam, about three hours drive, for a very important business in Kottayam only to find out that evening that a sudden and unexpected all-Kerala strike, illegal as well as immoral, was declared by the Communist Party of India, Marxist (CPM), for the following day causing me and millions of Keralites major inconvenience. The strike was declared to protest the arrest of a major politician (district secretary) who was involved in the planning of a well-known political murder. It certainly was to the great credit of the Communist Party of India (CPI) to dissociate itself from the strike even though the CPI was criticized and put down by the state General Secretary of CPM for its non-cooperation with the strike. This indicates that there are still some courageous leaders in the Communist Party to take a moral stance in a morally degenerate climate that is getting worse every day. It was also very commendable that a writers’ guild released a statement on the day following the strike decrying the CPM attacks against democracy. What surprised me most was the lack of moral response from religious leaders who ought to have been outraged at the very vicious and immoral hartal (general strike) that paralyzed an entire state.

             The greatest social and political cancer on Kerala society eating away the most precious gift – freedom – won after so many sacrifices including lives and so much prolonged suffering from the colonial invaders and masters. The Marxist Party as the advocate of the downtrodden masses seems to have recently suffered a severe setback after another of its major politician (district secretary) boastfully ranted a list of several vengeful political murders in a public political forum a few weeks ago. It is unthinkable that a state in the Indian Union that has the highest literacy should have sunken so low. The general paralysis effected by fear and learned helplessness has taken over the whole society as political goondas (hired thugs) and goons unleash murderous violence as they indulge in their dance of death.

             A friend of mine recently told me with some kind of resignation to the inevitable that Malayalees (persons of Kerala) queue up before liquor stores and meat stores on the eve of the hartal to celebrate it as they are afraid to venture out on the day of strike. Most are afraid of suffering injuries from their vehicles stoned and damaged. As I am examining myself, I do not have the courage that I had in 2007 when I drove for hours on deserted roads on that day of hartal. I would certainly like to recover that courage. Looks like I would have to take some risk of injury to my body or damage to my vehicle for the freedom I so much value, and without which life has no real value. Here I am reminded of the words of the American statesman, Patrick Henry: “Is life so dear or peace so sweet to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty, or give me death!” Mahatma Gandhi exhorted that his non-violence was not that of the coward. A coward dies many times in his life while a brave person dies only once. A coward in fact is a dead man existing and going through motions of life but not really living.

Partys Above the Law

            After a gruelling night-drive on August 7- 8, 2012 in the Western Ghats from Munnar, India, to Kochi International Airport and from there to St. Louis, Missouri, USA via Doha and Houston taking about 36 hours (of which 22.5 hours were in the air) I am still recovering from the jet-lag on the other side of the globe. I am completely turned around in that day has become night and night day. Fortunately some timely showers broke the long spell of sweltering August heat of St. Louis, in the mid-west, USA. I had a lot of time to think about in the plane and waiting lounges. After getting here, somehow I could not shake of the reports of the pathetic politics of murders engaged in Kerala especially by the Communist Party Marxist. That its misguided, obscurantist, and autocratic leaders could viciously consider someone leaving the party a kulamkuthi (stabber of one’s own family) or could make a widely reported and highly provocative statement to the effect that not even the Indian army can have access to a person suspected of a crime is kept somewhere in their party’s hiding place is unthinkable in a democratic country such as India.

            This kind of challenges can be construed to constitute seditious materials in a legally constituted democratic state. The strike on August 1, 2012, precipitously declared after the arrest of a prominent leader, who is reported to have facilitated through phone conversation the now famous murder of the defected party member, by impetuous, impulsive, and misguided party leaders spawning uncontrolled violence, and causing immense harm and untold suffering and inconvenience to the public while central forces summoned to quell unruly violence and keep peace was not employed is entirely unprecedented and totally unconscionable and unacceptable. The elected or appointed officials abetting such paralysis through neglect of duty have to certainly give an account to the general public. At this point I want to make very clear that I believe in non-violence and I would advocate very restrained and calculated force, however much I hate it, for the greater common good and only in extreme situations of the break-down-of law and order where a few anti-social elements would keep by far the greater majority at bay by threats and intimidations. It is also important to note that the report of the content of the taped conversation played by the police investigators in front of the arrested leader of the party in the face of his persistent denials in utter disregard for truth was widely circulated to the general public through the communication media, I presume, to inform and prepare the general public to prevent them from any possible rash and reckless behavior. This strike was not for protecting human rights; it was, on the contrary, to create chaos and anarchy so that a person who may have been an accomplice in the commitment of a crime may not be duly prosecuted. What about the rights of the innocent victim who was murdered in such a cruel way for exercising his fundamental freedom of choice?! Yesterday it was his unwanted murder. Tomorrow, God forbid, it might be mine or yours for that matter! No individual or party is above the law. Let the law with due process deal with the criminals. I am also appalled by the report of a judge who chose to leave the state earlier than planned to take his assignment in another state on account of some threats he received. Does a soldier in our army facing bullets in the border areas below freezing temperature to secure our security and freedom have the same choice? I do not think so. These are extraordinary times when all right-thinking and freedom-loving people need to do our little bit to support one another and to boost our morale lest we be overtaken by chaos and totalitarianism. Then it will be too late. Certainly we do not want to be silent spectators and repeat the history of Hitler’s Nazi Germany where over six million (60 lakhs) innocent Jews were killed when humanity was a silent spectator. In the light of many recent shocking revelations on murderous politics related to CPM in the media, I just happened to highlight some of the undemocratic activities of CPM.

            To be fair, other political parties are not far behind CPM in undemocratic ways and inciting mob violence leading to destruction, injuries, and deaths. Only they are not yet reported to be so systematic as the CPM in eliminating others. I also want to make it clear that in the depth of my being I am a communist, and I have suffered in good measure for the genuine communist values that I zstood for. Only I cannot stomach the antics of political shenanigans in India who use politics without principles to advance their own hidden agenda and to line their own and their cronies’ pockets.