{"id":260786,"date":"2015-11-26T17:55:12","date_gmt":"2015-11-26T12:25:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.tehelka.com\/?p=260786"},"modified":"2015-11-26T17:55:12","modified_gmt":"2015-11-26T12:25:12","slug":"why-hate-on-kiss-of-love","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/why-hate-on-kiss-of-love\/","title":{"rendered":"Why hate on Kiss of Love?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Ripple
Ripple effect<\/strong> Kiss of Love events were held outside Kerala as well. Photo: Vijay Pandey<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure>
\nThere is a huge backlash across Kerala against activists and others associated with the Kiss of Love protest which opposed moral policing. What provoked the torrent of abuses \u2014 vile and misogynistic for the most part \u2014 was the arrest of two persons associated with the protest, Rahul P asupalan and his wife and model Resmi R Nair, for alleged prostitution and soliciting.
\nThe previously unknown couple rose to prominence when they were part of a small group who were bullied and harassed at the curtain raiser of the event a year ago. As the scuffle was broadcast live on TV, Rahul and Resmi became the faces of the protest. They were routinely invited to discussions on television and featured on news stories related to the event.
\nThe movement had just marked its first anniversary and there were discussions on the successes and failures of the movement in the social media. The arrests, however took the discourse on an abrupt new direction.
\nAs soon as the news spread, the opponents of the movement pounced upon it with glee declaring that it was a cover for flesh trade. The Facebook walls and WhatsApp profiles of people who had supported the Kiss of Love protest were flooded with jokes, innuendos and insults.
\nSome news outlets of the state competed among themselves to make the story as sleazy as possible, with links of a paedophile Facebook page and sex trafficking of minors thrown in. All this made it seem as if the Kiss of Love protest movement was something that Rahul and Resmi cleverly used to further their alleged sex trade.
\nIn a later interview to The Newsminute portal, IG\u00a0of police (Crime Branch), S Sreejith said the couple had nothing to do with the paedophile page. He added that although they were not involved in trafficking of minors, they were aware that the racket was involved in it.
\nAlthough the organisers and participants are busy defending themselves and the movement, the arrests have hit the movement, which sprang up as a response to Sangh Parivar activists vandalising a restaurant in Kozhikode following a TV news report that \u2018immoral activities\u2019 were taking place there. Jolly Chirayath, a participant of the movement, says that the movement was not one which sprang up in a day or two but it was the culmination of resistance against moral policing that has been steadily on the rise.
\nCouples were routinely harassed for travelling together or for sitting in public parks or beaches. In some cases, people were even beaten to death because they were found in situations deemed inappropriate by the right-wing vigilante groups, which were getting emboldened by the day.
\nMoral policing was not confined to those on the right side of the political spectrum. Even some cadres of the youth wing of the CPM\u00a0, the Democratic Youth Federation of India (DYFI), were involved in such cases. The then CPM\u00a0State Secretary Pinarayi Vijayan was critical of the mode of protest chosen by the youngsters.
\nThe idea of kissing in the streets as a form of radical protest took root among a few, who organised the first Kiss of Love event at Kochi on 2 November. The movement soon captured the imagination of the nation and was emulated in several places inside and outside Kerala. It also brought fame to those who had spearheaded the movement, including Rahul and Resmi.
\n
\nNow, their arrests have given an outlet for conservative resentment against the movement and provided an \u2018aha\u2019 moment for those who claimed the protests would lead to sexual debauchery and rise in prostitution.
\n\u201cRahul and Resmi were just two of the hundreds of people who took part in the protests and it was the media which made both icons of the protest,\u201d says Harish Vasudevan Sreedevi, another leading face in the Kiss of Love movement and a lawyer and environmental activist.
\n\u201cWe strongly protest attempts in the media to link the arrests to the movement and thereby tarnish its image. If I am arrested tomorrow for some other crime then the movement and its members are not to be blamed. The politics raised by Kiss of Love is still relevant,\u201d he says.
\nThe activists say that the very nature of the abuse, point to the fact that a movement such as Kiss of Love was the need of the hour and that it was successful in making its impact felt across Kerala and rest of the country. \u201cWe are not yet free from moral policing and the movement\u2019s importance in the coming days is significant,\u201d says Thirayath.
\nCPM\u00a0\u00a0MP MB Rajesh, who was one of the rare politicians who had lent support to the movement says, \u201cThere are many criticisms against me both online and offline for taking a position on this. I have no regret in taking part in the movement and will continue supporting such protests in the future too,\u201d he says.
\nCongress MLA\u00a0VT Balram is another who had faced flak for sticking his neck out for the Kiss of Love. He said that he will continue to support movements against any threat to the fundamental rights of citizens in the name of religion, culture and morality.
\nThe Kiss of Love movement was an unorganised coming together of previously unconnected youth to condemn growing acts of moral policing across India. The public display of affection was the only connecting thread between the protesters in various towns of Kerala, Kolkata and Delhi.
\nThis being the case, the charges against two of its activists ought not debase a movement which has triggered vocal protests against patriarchial values across India. It was also the inspiration for several protests in Kerala including the \u201cBreak the Curfew\u201d at College of Engineering, Trivandrum, which sought to extend the timings of the girls\u2019 hostel and the protests against gender segregation in Farook College in Kozhikode district.
\nadarsh@tehelka.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The charges of online prostitution on a couple associated with the Kiss Of Love movement have spawned a barrage of insults towards those associated with the protest.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":70,"featured_media":260797,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[56],"tags":[6358,1605,429,6541,466,6542,1714,2197,1891,6543,6544,6545],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260786"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/users\/70"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=260786"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260786\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=260786"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=260786"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=260786"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}