In Kerala, politics of the supernatural takes centre stage

Supernaturalism seems poised to become a leitmotif in Kerala politics. 

A grainy night-time video showing a person assiduously digging for buried “dark magic artefacts”, purportedly in the precincts of Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) president K. Sudhakaran’s residence in Kannur, went viral on social and mainstream media. 

The video shows an individual cracking open small earthen vessels and extracting totems, copper plates, and idols from the soil.

Denied involvement

The video footage, of unknown provenance, place, and date, has people speaking in the background. Several media outlets claimed the voices were those of Mr. Sudhakaran and Congress leader Rajmohan Unnithan, MP. Mr. Unnithan and Mr. Sudhakaran’s office denied any involvement. 

It’s not the first time politicians have talked about supernatural curses and black magic. Congress leader V.M. Sudheeran posted on social media that he found strange artefacts around his house in Thiruvananthapuram when he was KPCC president. 

In May, ahead of the declaration of the Lok Sabha election results, Karnataka Deputy Chief Minister D.K. Shivakumar alleged that political rivals had used a locality in Kerala as a secret sanctum to conduct occult practices, including animal sacrifice, against himself and Chief Minister Siddaramaiah. 

He identified the location as a private premise within a 15 km radius of the iconic Rajarajeshwari Temple at Taliparamba in Kannur, the hotbed of Left politics in Kerala, not the temple itself. He claimed that the sorcery involved ritualistic sacrifice of 51 animals, mainly livestock.

Mr. Shivakumar’s startling remark triggered a raucous debate about the occult’s opaque relationship to power and modernity in electoral politics. It also goaded the State government to defend Kerala’s renaissance legacy and progressive vision. 

Higher Education Minister R. Bindu said Kerala society had relegated such dark-age practices to the dustbin of history. Communist Party of India (Marxist) State secretary M.V. Govindan said irrational indulgence in black magic seemed endemic in the Congress and Bharatiya Janata Party. 

‘Criminals and cowards’

Congress leader Cherian Philip said those indulging in the occult to settle personal scores were criminals, cowards, and fools. 

Black-magic-related crime and exploitation have repeatedly roiled Kerala society. In a telling instance in 2022, superstition and irrational greed for some non-existent hidden treasure prompted the ritual sacrifice of two women and cannibalism by a set of occult practitioners at a house in a secluded neighbourhood at Elanthoor in Pathanamthitta district.