The highly anticipated movie “The Kerala Story” is required viewing for all Sunday school students in grades 10 through 12 according to the Idukki diocese of the Syro-Malabar Catholic Church.
The Bollywood film had previously been broadcast on Doordarshan on Friday, in spite of vocal objections from Kerala’s ruling CPM and Congress.
The media director of the Idukki diocese stated in an interview with News18 that this year’s class topic was love marriage and infidelity in the name of love. He went on to say that they had instructed the students to watch the film because it was pertinent to the topic.
The youth wing of the CPM, Democratic Youth Federation of India (DYFI) had screened a video, ‘The Kerala Story True or Fake?’ by YouTuber Dhruv Rathee, at various places across the state to debunk the movie. The youth Congress had also expressed their strong dissent and staged a protest march to the Doordarshan office against the broadcast of the movie.
The CPI(M) and the Congress in Kerala had also lodged separate complaints with the Election Commission of India against Doordarshan’s decision to air the controversial movie, alleging it could potentially polarise society along religious lines and urged the poll panel to intervene and stop its screening.
However, the BJP claimed that the theme of the movie was real and wondered why the Left and the Congress were opposing it. The Leader of the Opposition in the Assembly, V D Satheesan, sent a letter to the Election Commission, seeking to direct Doordarshan to withdraw from its decision to telecast “the extremely malicious ‘The Kerala Story’ movie”.
Congress leader V D Satheesan spoke on Idukki diocese’s decision and said, “It is a wrong approach. The Kerala story has been created to insult Kerala . Is there such incidents in Kerala? We are not agreeing with Kerala story which has created in an imaginary story which is not existing in Kerala.” He further said, “We are not agreeing with it ,we are the people who have written not to screen it even in Doordarshan.”
Read More
Special Express Extended to Mangaluru Central with Revised Timings
