26-06-2011 Kerala Commentary
Who will change a mother's name because it does not keep up with the newest trends?
P.S.Remesh Chandran,
Editor, Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum.
Have anyone heard about anyone who wants to change his mother's name just because it is not fashionable in his outlook and also because it does not keep up with the newest trends? Kerala seems to have given birth to such brutes too. Kerala is the land of Malayaalees, a name endeared to hundreds of thousands of Malayaalees and Non-Malayaalees in India and abroad for so many years. This name Kerala was derived from Kera which means the Coconut Tree and Alam which means Where Something Is In Abundance. Thus Keralam means The Land Of Coconut Trees. This has been known to the world and accepted by the world since the time of Trans-Ocean Travels. This name has been being loved by the whole world without any problem so far. But now some crooked-minded
people in Kerala are vigorously working on changing this beautiful, meaningful and respected name of Kerala to suit their private needs.
They are simply aiming at the huge amounts of money they can pocket through the immense contracts for effecting the change in name in the millions of Governmental and other records, printed stationery, display boards, buildings, vehicles, doors, carpets and even on glasses and ash trays. People who would even sell their mothers for a few Dollars! They shout Madras was changed as Tamil Nadu, Andhra as Andhra Pradesh, Bombay as Mumbai and so on. But the wise people in these states have been thinking, how decent and loyal a model state is this Kerala for not even thinking about changing their mother's natural virgin name, sacred to uncountable millions everywhere!
This hideous plan for changing the name of Keralam to something like Kerala Desam or Malayaaala Nadu or to whatever it is, has not been hatched out in a single night out of greed for money alone. There have always been plans going on hatched out to divert people's attention from the utter administrative failure in curtailing corruption, bribery, misappropriation of huge amounts of government money, inability to cope with the newly arising serious, serial outbreak of epidemics and other health hazards and above all, the abandoning of political figure-heads by their own so-called followers. The time at which this idea of changing Kerala's name was released from some corners was the time at which noted power-politicians were undeniably accused of corruption and threatened with prosecution.