Kerala This Week 2006, 2

The Kerala State Industries Development Corporation has offered to assist all the 140 MLAs in Kerala, who were sworn in today, to help them set an Industrial Park "in their backyard". It was meant to help the "public servants" develop their own constituencies, but there are already rumours of the faithful elected leaders taking it very literally and wanting to make the parks their own backyard.

Meanwhile taking a cue from the Madhya Pradesh government, where Babulal Gaur's BJP government wanted to sell cow's urine (gomutra) with milk in co-operative dairy milk booths, our leaders are said to be concentrating on how the state's natural resources can be put to better use. As revealed by one of the leaders, the only natural resource we have that our leaders can identify with, is our unemployed youth and the future of these youth in Kerala lies in politics. But the Greater Urine Project is on the backburner, along with Smart City, after someone warned them that terrorists had found a means of innovative communication - by penning their letters in urine, which works as invisible ink.

Speaking of Morarji, I mean.. err..whatever..last weeks headline read: "Who said 83 is not an age for change?" Kerala Chief Minister V S Achuthanandan who used to oppose everything his predecessor Oommen Chandy (now opposition leader) did, appears to have been born-again. Seen as an opponent of IT, as it neglected farmers and labourers, Achu seems to be going all out to attract investors and has already met with IT majors like Infy and USTech. He assured a commitment to create 5,000 IT jobs in one year. His son, supposedly a MCA graduate and an "avid" entrepreneur himself, looked on with enthusiasm and anticipation. Achu seems to be very anxious to get rid of the "anti-development" tag on his back, and it is working well for the state. So far, So good. Everybody is wooing everybody these days!

Kerala’s rubber farmers meanwhile celebrated, with the price of one kilogram of rubber crossing the Rs 100 mark for the first time, while tea prices also seem to be skyrocketing. The rain Gods also seem to be generous this year, with monsoon arriving a week earlier than the IMD predictions. But with the lightning and thunder, not only are we losing television sets and computers, the KSEB seems to be "tripping" in jeopardy. Last night, after incessant mosquito bites, I called up the KSEB control room at 1am to report loss of power and I was surprised when I was greeted with a "namaskaram" instead of the usual "ahh??" or " nggeehh??"

Entertainment in Kerala remained to be focussed on its usual sources. More soft-porn hits have been released and the previous box-office hits continued to rake in the moolahs. I also managed to glimpse upon a "hit" program on TV called "swarnamazha", which was quite nauseating to say the least. The anchor Urvashi, an actor, who reportedly gained weight specially for this role, seemed to be well anchored,with gold jutting out of all possible locations and soldering her to the ground. Gold rain after all.

There is also a protest brewing as "gastronomic delights" from Trivandrum city's first Italian restaurant, Casa Bianca, run "allegedly" by an Italian lady, has affected the sales of exclusive and original Italian food served by the likes of Ambalapattu Rest-or-rant and Hotel Vasantham. "Italian running the country and now an Italian ruining our Italian!" the protestors cried!