As director Sudipto Sen’s controversial film The Kerala Story heads to theatres, political organisation Muslim Youth League has challenged the makers to prove the veracity of a contentious claim made in the film’s teaser — that “32,000 girls” from Kerala were forcibly converted and allegedly recruited to the militant outfit ISIS. The state committee of the organisation has announced a monetary reward of Rs 1 crore if the makers produce proof that 32,000 women from Kerala had converted to Islam and migrated to Syria or Yemen, as claimed in the teaser. As part of the campaign, two other concerned individuals from Kerala have also come forward with promises of monetary rewards if the film’s makers take up the challenge.
In the film’s first teaser released in November last year, actor Adah Sharma who plays the protagonist in the film can be seen delivering a monologue, claiming that a deadly game is being played to convert normal girls into dreaded terrorists in Kerala. “My name was Shalini Unnikrishnan, I wanted to serve humanity by becoming a nurse. Now I am Fathima Ba. An ISIS terrorist in Afghanistan jail. I am not alone, like me there are 32,000 girls who have already been converted and buried in the desert of Syria and Yemen,” she says. The claim immediately courted controversy, but five months later, the makers are yet to provide any evidence to back the veracity of this data despite calls from several quarters to do so.
Meanwhile, blogger and writer Nazeer Hussain Kizhakkedath has also offered a reward of Rs 10 lakh to anyone who can produce evidence that at least 10 women, let alone 32,000, were converted and forced to join ISIS. “I am offering Rs 10 lakh to anyone who publishes information such as names and addresses of the women who were converted to Islam and made to become members of the Islamic State by the Muslim youth of Kerala, as is claimed in the propaganda film The Kerala Story. No need to produce proof for 32,000 women, just 10 are enough,” his Facebook post said.
Nazeer further noted that Merin and Nimisha — who were married to brothers Bexan Vincent and Besten Vincent — and Sonia Sebastian were the only persons reported to have joined ISIS from outside the Muslim community in Kerala. “Everyone should stop blaming a community and a state without any proof about the love jihad case which was dismissed even by the High Court,” he added.
Citing Nazeer as an inspiration, Malayalam actor and lawyer S Shukkur also put up a Facebook post stating that he was offering Rs 11 lakh to anyone who can publish information about at least 32 Kerala women who were converted and forced to become ISIS members.
The film’s trailer, which released on April 26, however does not mention the number 32,000. Instead, the description says, “The Kerala Story is a compilation of the true stories of three young girls from different parts of Kerala. Thousands of innocent women have been systematically converted, radicalised, and their lives destroyed. It is their side of the story.”
The film’s makers have also recently backtracked from stressing on the statistics, claiming that the focus “should not be on the numbers, but on the story.” In a recent interview, director Sudipto Sen claimed that the film never said 32,000 women from Kerala were made to join ISIS, but just that they were “converted”.