While the Christian community leaders in Kerala try to arm-twist the BJP rulers in Delhi by asking for a minimum support price for rubber, local party leaders decide to bend over backward to the church’s quasi-extortion bid. On Sunday, Mar Joseph Pamplany, Arch Bishop of Roman Catholic church, Thalassery, in north Kerala, asked the Centre to hike Natural rubber rates to ₹300 a kilogram. In exchange, he promised a Member of Parliament for the BJP from Kerala.
Pamplany was addressing a Catholic farmers’ conference meeting when the Bishop admitted there was no need to keep the country’s ruling party away from the church. Having voted for Congress all these years, the Christian community feels they have been let down. Congress has 19 MPs from Kerala, including Rahul Gandhi from the hilly terrains of Wayanad in North Kerala.
Could the recent BJP wins from Christian-dominated North East have triggered Pamplany’s response? An estimated 15 lakh Christian families depend on rubber in Kerala. Plenty of cheap rubber is available for import, and prohibitive labor rates exist in Kerala. Rubber rates currently hover around ₹120 a kilo, while farmers claim it costs them ₹220 to produce.
Local BJP leaders fell for the trap. On Monday, BJP District President N Haridas and Minority Morcha District President Arun Thomas visited Pamplany. They promised that the demand for a rubber rate increase would be brought to the attention of the central government. Radical Islam and grooming jihad, too, were part of their discussion. Archbishops from Wayanad, Thrissur, and Kottayam have come out in support of Pamplany.
The Bishop’s statement rattled local Communist and Congress leaders. As usual, the All India Congress Committee (AICC) general secretary K C Venugopal tried fear-mongering. He said, “Hope the Bishop had forgotten about the attack against church and priests in north Indian states.” Venugopal must remember the only opposition is toward forced conversion, and many states have implemented strict laws.
“Nobody will keep a hen with a fox. How can the church support protagonists of Hindu Rashtra?” asked state minister for local self-government M B Rajesh. Local communists have bought this situation upon themselves. By blindly appeasing local radical Islamists, they have left out the Christian community, and Kerala has become a den for grooming jihad. Many Christians have left their rubber estates to their old parents, surrendered their Bharatiya passports, and settled in countries like America, Canada, and Australia.
Rubber farming had destroyed large tracts of prime forest lands, wreaked havoc on the ground water table levels, and accelerated soil erosion. The central government can promote rotational crops as an alternative to rubber. Many plantations are anyway slaughtering rubber plants and moving towards other cash crops. Once the church realizes the benefits, it will tag along.
Currently, the central government provides MSP for wheat and rice in many northern states. Farmers in Punjab enjoy the majority of these benefits. This has led to a situation where they grow water-intensive rice, thereby depleting water levels. An estimated 60% of Kerala’s rainwater flows into the sea, carrying with it rich nutrient soil.
BJP leaders are wooing the janjatiya in Wayanad and are working hard to open its Lok Sabha seat in Kerala. The CPM pins its hopes on the Muslim votes that have seen a population explosion in Kerala. Congress is now exploring the option of fielding Rahul Gandhi from Kanyakumari in Tamil Nadu in the 2024 Lok Sabha election. Christian conversion mafia has ensured that Kanyakumari is now 75% Christian.
