Kerala - Day No. 1

      Kerala welcomed us with the official strike of the transport workers that included even taxi and rickshaw drivers, what did not stop us from getting to our hotel. It is important to say that this strike is a display of Kerala’s reality – in which workers are united and not afraid of fighting for their rights. This is part of something bigger of so called Kerala model. This model is based on high social standards: life expectancy, literacy rates, accessibility to the health care and the education – yet, at the same time not supported by the economic growth (e.g. high GDP – gross domestic product). To say it simply, the GDP is very low, but some standards of living are as high as in the developed countries.

However, it is not always visible at the first time, not always when you see Kerala first, before seeing the rest of India. Kerala has 38 million people, the same as Poland or Canada, yet it is eight times smaller than my country. Here, you do not have many paths for pedestrians, the traffic is ruled by only two laws: “to die or to survive,” what comes to you extremely true when you find yourself surrounded by rickshaws, filled to a single spot busses, and cars as well as people trying to make it while crossing one side of the road to another. The trash can is a rare thing. Yet, people live as long as us, they all can read and write, and they are politically aware…

What was surprising to me – the number of Christian churches, when you drive you see them on almost every corner – this is not surprising, Christians constitute 18 percent of the local population – this includes the traditional Malabar Church which is believed to be established by St. Thomas. In the city center of Thiruvananthapuram there is a beautiful cathedral in a close perimeter of the local government headquarter – which is often inhabited by the Socialists majority. And to the Socialists that with off-s and on-s rule Kerala some people ascribe the social success of this land; others talk about diversity and the history of openness in Kerala for everyone, also for Christian missionaries who opened here schools and hospitals; also some say that all well-being of Kerala originates in the money which comes from migrant workers from Kerala to the countries of the Persian Gulf (1/6 of the total work force). Kerala for sure is inspiring, but for sure has also its problems – there is no a golden rule, but there are places that are precious for the change like the Center for Development Studies which is a home to the knowledge on different, also alternative ways of development. For sure the number of people who can write and read is extraordinary to an Indian state, with more than 90 percent of the literate people. Yet contrasts are everywhere: some of those educated people still for example prefer arranged marriages – when you ask them: “Do you love your wife?” they respond: “No! This is an arranged marriage…”


Lukasz W. Niparko