Is the RSS attempting to arm-twist business groups, media in Kerala?

In the latest development to the S Hareesh controversy, famed jewellery group Bhima Jewellers decided to with draw its advertisements from Mathrubhumi group of publications. This has come after tremendous pressure from Hindu right wingers who came down heavily on Mathrubhumi for publishing his novel Meesha (Moustache).

Only three chapters of writer S Hareesh’s novel Meesha had been published when the threats from Hindutva organisations forced him to withdraw his novel.

In a Facebook post a couple of days ago, without naming the newspaper, Bhima Jewellers had mentioned that “Bhima, as you know, is a 94-year-old brand and a responsible business group. We give importance to public sentiments and wish to stay away from controversies of any kind. We have noted your concerns and have informed our advertising agency to put our ads to the publication concerned in abeyance.”

Bhima Jewellers has claimed on their FB page that there had been many comments to withdraw their ads from the paper. There were around 600 comments for their August 4 and 5 advertisements, where most of them had asked the group to ‘boycott Mathrubhumi’, but there were a few other posts that derided Mathrubhumi’s decision to do so. The trolls warned that they would ask supporters to boycott Bhima showrooms in all districts.

The right wing trolls had stated that since the paper had refused to apologise for carrying the extract and instead had even published an editorial on the the front page supporting the decision to carry the extract, Mathrubhumi must be ‘taught a lesson’.

But, is that all there is to that? A few days after Hareesh was trolled, a young girl Hanan Hameed, whose story was highlighted by Mathrubhumi, was viciously trolled online. She was humiliated online for selling fish, among other odd jobs she had taken, to make ends meet. The online backlash against Hanan forced her to prove that she wasn’t lying and wasn’t a ‘publicity stunt’.

Leveraging these controversies, Janmabhumi, the RSS’ Malayalam mouthpiece has launched a separate campaign titled "From Mathrubhumi to Janmabhumi". With this campaign launched on the Facebook, it has appealed to the Hindu readers of Mathrubhumi to switch to the RSS publication. The RSS publication has been struggling to survive in the highly competitive market in Kerala especially because of its poor literary standards.

The Facebook post which was been circulated around the same time, highlighted a campaign, “From Mathrubhumi to Janmabhumi. The war on social media against the anti-Hindutva ideology of Mathrubhumi will be taken to the too. Those who are in favour of our movement, please share this post.”

Criticising the campaign, media critic Paul Sebastian, says, “No sensible reader will opt for Janmabhoomi, after rejecting Mathrubhoomi. Mathrubhoomi is considered as a paper for the Hindus and now it is being boycotted by the very same people. There can be no comparison.”

The post goes on to add that the campaign will run from July 27 to August 1. It asks Mathrubhumi subscribers to call their newspaper agents to inform them that they would be switching to Janmabhumi. “In the last two weeks, Mathrubhumi has lost 50,000 subscribers and this number should each two lakhs. Agents of other newspapers might approach you, but do not get lured,” stated the FB post. The post cautions users to not expect the same standards from Janmabhumi, that they are used to from Mathrubhumi. The post requests readers to stay with Janmabhumi for three months patiently because by then they would become used to Janmabhumi.

The post states that, ‘Of the more than 15 popular dailies in Kerala, Malayala Manorama and Mathrubhumi are the top two and the third is occupied by the enemy paper Deshabhimani. They get lakhs in advertisements. We will also get these advertisements if we have more subscribers. With this campaign, we our subscription numbers become more than Deshabhimani.’ It then goes on to list the numbers of newspaper agents in various districts.

Expressing his shock, Malayalam academician and social commentator MN Karassery said, “This is completely undemocratic. This is just business, not even politics. The paper has published a serialised novel by S Hareesh. If someone doesn’t like it, they have the right to protest in a democratic way. This is nothing but undemocratic and fascist.”

“This shows their mentality. NSS and BJP have grabbed the chance. There is a saying in Malayalam “Kainanayathe meen pidikkuka” (Fishing without wetting your hands), that is what they are attempting to do. RSS cadre will also go from house to house under this pretext, because the election is also approaching. This campaign will not win in Kerala,” says Karassery emphatically.

Incidentally, Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan had come down heavily against the trolls and in case of Hanan Hamid, a person was arrested by the police too.