‘Down with communalism. Long live secularism! It was the chants that ripped through the air outside the Palakkad municipality office on Friday, as the DYFI (CPI (M) youth wing) marched into the office and displayed the building’s Indian tricolor.
This was DYFI’s retaliation to the BJP for celebrating their victory in the township with a ‘Jai Shri Ram’ banner on Wednesday. The BJP won 28 of the 52 seats in the local body elections and gained control of the Palakkad municipality. To celebrate their victory, BJP cadres hung banners of Amit Shah and Modi and one more that read “Jai Shri Ram” in Malayalam from the top of the building on Wednesday. The celebrations quickly became controversial and they were widely condemned on social media for using a religious slogan in a government building, after a video went viral.
The incident became even more controversial after BJP Secretary of State Sandeep G Varier posted a video of the celebratory demonstrations in Palakkad with the caption “Palakkad is the Gujarat of Kerala.”
On Friday morning, Palakkad police hired some BJP cadres who were allegedly responsible for the celebrations. Shortly afterwards, Palakkad DYFI cadres held a demonstration in Palakkad municipality, raising slogans against communalism. Following this, a tricolor flag was unfurled from the same place in the building from where the Jai Shri Ram flag was hung.
In a live Facebook video posted on the DYFI Palakkad page, cadres could be seen marching with a banner that read: “This is not an RSS office, this is a municipal office. This is not Gujarat but Kerala … DYFI marches towards Palakkad municipality.
“In the north, the BJP paints saffron in different places, hangs Jai Shri Ram banners, Ayodhya posters, places images of Sivaji and Golwalker everywhere and other communal symbols where they have control. But this is Kerala, and this type of celebration will not be tolerated by the secular people of Kerala, nor by the secular people of Palakkad, ”DYFI District Secretary TM Sasi told TNM.
Sasi also added that “just because the BJP won the Palakkad municipality in the local body elections, they cannot hang non-secular symbols in the area.” “This is an administrative center in a democracy and therefore we can only hang symbols of democracy. Communalizing the place, even if it is done by any religious majority or minority, will be strongly rejected,” Sasi added.
This is not RSS Karyalay, this is the municipal office.
This is not Guajarat, this is Kerala. pic.twitter.com/7eKOqAv4cg– Halla Bol (@e_salam) December 18, 2020
The Bharatiya Janata Party or BJP has failed to make great strides in local body polls and has only managed to win 10 out of 941 grass panchayats in Kerala. Besides winning the Palakkad Township, he has also gained control of the Pandalam Township in Pathanamthitta.
In Palakkad, while Congress had won 13 seats last time, this year it fell behind previous election numbers by 1 seat, winning just 12. The LDF, which had won 9 seats in 2015, was reduced to six seats this year.
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