Review: The Kerala Story

When I watched "The Kashmir Files" in theatre, I didn't watch it for the story because I already knew the tragic testimonies of Kashmiri Pandits, it was for supporting the unbiased & courageous initiative by its makers. Same goes for Kerala Story, although I didn't know the exact story of those girls this time but have been following the fledgling Islamic radicalism in Kerala for a while.

However, there are limitations of this film in the sense of outright and unbiased showcasing of a religion deeply caught up in radicalism. It's more like the Vidhu Vinod Chopra's earlier film on Kashmir, Shikara which?left us frustrated due to the willful sugar coating of a genocidal event and propelled Vivek Agnihotri to dive into this topic and bring out a truer version. Similarly, Kerala Story also shows all the "Effects" of radicalism but shies away from openly criticizing the "Causes" of these radical aspects of a popular religion.

Islam has multiple aspects - Spiritual, Philosophical, Legal, Social, Political & Militant. Radicalism irrespective of the subjective ideology, always have just 2 aspects, hard(actual perpetrators) & soft(vocal defenders). The basic tactics of the Soft radicals is to find a smaller target which doesn't invite the wrath of the masses but does the "job". E.g. Use RSS, Bajrang dal to deceptively target Hinduism. This film has used the same logic by showing some "organization" running the conversion racket for "ISIS" while not exposing(actually covering up) the widespread ideological bases. The important point to note here is they haven't mentioned Al-Qaeda, Taliban or Hamas. These "other" organizations actually have more resonance with Indian radicals and could have created a bigger backlash. Not that it hasn't and not that some people have joined these "other" organizations but there have been their sleeper cells or accomplices accused & even convicted, leave alone the 1000s of Soft defenders. There is indeed a role of Intelligence agencies in developing modern Militant Islam, it's not the proprietary of the radicals alone but that doesn't deny their heinous & inhuman acts. That's a topic for another day so back to the subject.

So, while this film hasn't been able to openly criticize Islam, it has still irked "Muslims" as being against Islam. The reason I use "Muslim" is not to term all of them as radicals, that's obviously not true, it's because the Soft radicals are rightfully targeted, the "Jaahils" are to be ignored and the "innocents" are always silent. So, all Muslims are under the scope of this statement, except of course the rare free thinking and openly vocal minority. The soft radicals are tactically always hyper-sensitive and try to thwart the slightest attempt to start discussing & debating Islam because they know, questioning is not good for their master fundoos. The moment you start examining a seemingly oppressive aspect of Islam specially against women, they are quick to term it as Islamophobic. It's illogical but actually, do they care about any(logic)? Not to forget their extremely acrobatic mental gymnastics demonstrated while trying to prove the logic behind the most objectional verses of their scriptures. They don't even appreciate the artistic maneuver of the filmmakers in not showing Islam in any bad light and limiting the ridicule to some "organization".

We must also understand that the girls shown in the film aren't actually the prime targets of radicalism. It's the Muslims themselves who get radicalized first with the hateful agenda and then they are unleashed on non-Muslims. When you are brainwashed from a tender age then your biased world view is really hard to break, no matter how unscientific the beliefs maybe. It enables them to commit unimaginable crimes without guilt in the name of "Allah". So, the film in that way fails to dig deeper into the root cause of the problem and portray that the most vulnerable to this venomous ideology are Muslims only and they need to be saved before anyone.

Politics also hasn't helped, Mamta Bannerjee & Kerala Govt openly banning a film is like stabbing the very basic tenet of our Constitution i.e. freedom of expression. Also, kudos to the Kerala High Court in rightly defending the makers right to tell their story. This is in fact beautifully covered in the film when Nimah Matthews says "Political silence is too big sir". But here the anti-BJP, leftists or left leaning parties aren't being silent, they are loudly supporting the radicals. No wonder this Leftist and Islamofascist nexus has bled the Indian sub-continent & Middle-east like a real "Dozakh ki aag(hellfire)". Their timed silence in certain issues historically has also been just a blind pass. Islam of the day in fact, is more political than religious. We all know that's not good for the society but there just isn't strong enough resistance to all this farce within Muslim communities.

Coming to aspects of filmmaking, as I mentioned earlier, there are limitations. There is always a limit to which you can tell a story and none can cover an issue 360 degrees. Atleast we haven't seen it, Kashmir Files was a bright spot in the way it told the Pandits' side unabashedly but again it couldn't cover the story of the causes of Radicalism and the Nationalist Kashmiri Muslims' side of the story. So we wait for another chapter on that turbulent period of our history. For that reason, both Shikara & Kashmir Files are not anti to each other in my view, the former started a trend and latter built upon it to address the larger discontent. It's an evolution, which is awaited for the next more intense version of the Kerala Story. I've mentioned these limitations for greater insights only, not?for criticizing the filmmakers as that would be taking away the creative and general liberty from them for their right to tell their stories their way.

On the ending note, please note that the producer Sudipto Sen has earlier also produced a documentary on this same issue - Love Jihad. Please do watch that too along with this one. We spend our hard earned money on the repetitive love stories, spy and what not, kind of films but this one has a meaningful message, so please do support the makers.

And remember, Respect but Introspect, keep questioning, be scientific. Thanks for reading.