Recently, on a Sunday, the Idukki diocese of the Syro-Malabar Catholic Church screened The Kerala Story for catechism students attending classes 10, 11, and 12. The Kerala Story, which hit theatres last year, tells the story of a group of women from Kerala who were forced to convert to Islam and join ISIS.
Catechism is a summary of the principles of the Christianian religion in the form of questions and answers used for religious teaching of biblical truth. This year, the catechism textbooks for teenagers focused on love relationships. In addition to participating in the training curriculum, the students were asked to discuss the film among themselves in their WhatsApp groups and gather reviews.
According to Diocese media coordinator Father Jinns Karakkat, this film’s screening aims to raise student awareness. “Teenagers are increasingly falling in love and experiencing dangers in certain situations. Consequently, we wanted to make our children aware of these risks,” the priest said.
The film taught students to be cautious when falling in love. Additionally, the students received a booklet on “love” from the diocese. Karakkat said that the pamphlet explained the dangers of “love jihad,” in which Islamists are reported to use intimacy as a pretext to entice naive Christian and Hindu teenagers to join the jihadist cause.
Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and Leader of the Opposition V.D. Satheesan had accused the central government of sanctioning the movie’s broadcast on Doordarshan to allegedly stoke sectarian divisions and cause communal polarisation in Kerala with an eye on the Hindu votes in the Lok Sabha elections.
The UDF (Congress-leaning parties) and the LDF (leftist outfits) also moved the Election Commission of India (ECI) against the film’s broadcast. Both appealed to Doordarshan to desist from screening the movie, to no avail.
CPI (M) leader MV Govindan described the movie as being “anti-Kerala, anti-Communist, and anti-Muslim.” Local leaders called the movie an attempt to tarnish Kerala’s image and an attempt to humiliate the southern state.
Several left-wing political organisations and neo-liberals objected to Doordarshan’s screening. Democratic Youth Federation of India (DYFI) workers protested against Doordarshan’s decision to screen the ‘Kerala Story’.
So, the church screened the movie after national broadcaster Doordarshan. They encouraged parish families to see it when it was shown on Doordarshan.
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader V. Muraleedharan (Minister of State for External Affairs) observed that people who were against the movie feared opposing viewpoints. Furthermore, he said that DD’s telecasting of the production was not illegal and that the Censor Board had approved the film for release.
Following this, The Thamarassery diocese’s Kerala Catholic Youth Movement (KCYM) section decided to show the movie on Saturday across 120 units under the diocese during the students’ “Suvisheshotsavam” vacation courses (but later chose not to).
According to Father George Vellakkakudiyil, the Diocese of Thamarassery’s director of KCYM, We have chosen to fight against the vested interests attacking the Idukki diocese. All of the objections against the movie are pointless.
This film is not prohibited and can be found for free on OTT platforms. According to the priest, the KCYM has stepped in for more than 320 cases that fall under the heading of “love jihad.”
At the last minute, the KCYM determined that since it is election season, showing the movie at this time would provoke needless discussions, something the diocese would prefer to avoid.
“The issue is being overly politicised at the moment, and that was never our intention,” Fr. Vellakkakudiyil said. “We have postponed the screening for a date after the general elections.” “Certain KCYM units have screened the film for a specific target audience. But he continued, we won’t make a formal announcement until after the polls.”
Bharath Dharma Jana Sena (BDJS) (political wing of the Sree Narayana Dharma Paripalana Yogam (SNDP) leader Sangeeta Viswanathan, the NDA candidate from Idukki, said that the movie ‘The Kerala Story’ on the theme of grooming jihad and Islamic terrorism will be screened in SNDP branches and women’s groups.
Sangeeta pointed out that love jihad and narcotic jihad are real. SNDP has held such discussions on calamities before. Sangeeta said that it (grooming/narco jihad) should be discussed in family meetings as well.
In 2021, the ‘love jihad’ scandal erupted in Kerala when the Bishop of Palai, Mar Joseph Kallarangatt, brought attention to the purported conspiracy. HinduPost reported that while addressing Christian devotees, the Syro-Malabar Catholic Bishop Kallarangatt said that the aim of Jihadis (Islamists who wage holy war to spread Islam) is to promote their religion and end non-Muslims.
For this, they use ‘love jihad’ and ‘narcotics jihad’. Kallarangatt said that narcotics jihad (Muslim boys utilising vulnerable Hindu and Christian girls using substance abuse) was visible everywhere, including hotels, juice bars, ice cream shops, rave parties, and other establishments where young people were trapped in drug addiction and had their lives ruined.
On a Friday, waves of Muslims staged marches to the Christian Bishop’s House in Pala, demanding legal action against him. CM Vijayan sided with the extremist Islamists and criticised Bishop Kallarangatt. The demonstrations set off an unprecedented movement of Christian and Hindu organisations.
On that Saturday, several of them marched in support of the bishop. Kerala Janapaksham chairman P.C. George coordinated the efforts to protect the bishop from the raving Popular Front of India (PFI) terrorists. The Islamists withdrew when they saw that the RSS had got involved in the issue.
It is mentioned in the film that 32000 Hindu/Christian girls were converted to Islam from Kerala. After all, doesn’t the first case of love jihad officially reported from Kerala involve a Christian girl? Who is forcing Christian priests to withdraw their decision to screen a movie on jihad?
