At a time when anti-fascist fronts strengthen across Kerala, new varieties of fascism raise their head, as proved by the painful experience of K T Sindhu from Payyoli. Sindhu has been active in public life as the Meladi block panchayat member and Payyoli grama panchayat president.
She is a director of Swalcos, a cooperative at Vadakara. She was at the cooperative’s office along with society president Thiruvalloor Murali around noon on March 11 when a group of youngsters reached the office and locked it from the outside. A television cameraman shot pictures of Sindhu and Murali through the glass doors. Before they knew what was happening, the police arrived and opened the office.
They shouted at Sindhu to go to the police station. A picture of Sindhu and Murali along with the policemen began to circulate on social media instantly. Even as they were being taken to the police station, posters have been put up along the way announcing the arrest for “immoral traffic”.
Evidently, much planning had gone into this entrapment and the circulation of the news, which happened within a few minutes. The mob which gathered in front of the Swalcos office to protect morality had a television channel’s camera crew ready with them. They could get the police reach the spot within minutes. They were no ordinary men.
The Vadakara Police did their part by making Sindhu stand from 2 pm to 7 am. When Sindhu told the police that she had difficulty in standing for that long and requested for a chair, the circle inspector said she had to stand.
How many more years will it take the police to understand that a police station was just another government office. How long will it take for us to recognise that women were humans too and deserved equal justice?
Sindhu demanded a medical examination since there was a fake allegation against her, but the circle inspector refused. A deputy superintendent of police had to intervene to ensure that a medical examination was conducted on her.
What would have caused this allegation and organised attack on a woman. It could be personal or political vendetta. But moral policing is not a decent and democratic means to get even with opponents.
There could be a situation where a woman and a man have to be together at a workplace or any other place. Is that immoral? What makes political organisations and their youth wings subscribe to this atrocity? They are preoccupied with concerns of immorality when they have nothing political to speak about.
They prepare for the battles of their lives by targeting a woman. This atrocity does not escape the label of fascism just because Sindhu and Murali belong to the Congress and their tormentors raised slogans of the Left.
They confine women to their bodies and punish them, and then proceed to infiltrate the anti-fascist collectives formed for the protection of democracy and social justice. That is the misfortune of contemporary Kerala.
