Kerala's netizens have time and again been in news for using creative hashtags and memes to react to various socio-political issues, as well as for trolling in the name of of some favourite actor or sportsperson . Many of these memes, derived from colloquial Malayalam usages or vernacular movie dialogues, make no sense to those outside the State. Here is a compilation of the few famous Malayalam hashtags and what they mean.
1. #KnappanYogi
The hashtag was trending on Twitter and Facebook to rib Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath's Kerala visit. Mr. Adityanath had visited Keecheri near Kannur on October 4 as a part of BJP State unit’s Jana Raksha Yatra (March to Save the People) where he criticised the State’s healthcare system for being inefficient. Social media users were quick to point out the irony of the statement considering that the Gorakhpur tragedy occurred in his jurisdiction. By the end of the day, the hashtag #KnappanYogi was trending on Twitter.
Knappan in colloquial Malayalam refers to a good-for-nothing person. Sir Arthur Rowland Knapp, a British officer of the Indian Civil Services, was apparently notorious for his inefficient administration — so much so that his name became synonymous with incompetence and was assimilated into everyday conversation as ‘knappan’.
2. #AlavalathyShaji / #AlavalathyReturns
This hashtag was coined when Amit Shah first visited Thiruvananthapuram in June. A rip-off of a famous dialogue mouthed by the late Malayalam actor Jayan, the hashtag pokes fun at the practice of referring to the BJP national president as ‘Shah ji’. Alavalathy means an uncouth person. When Mr. Shah returned to the State earlier this month, this hashtag was re-worked to ‘Shaji Returns’.
3. #PoMoneModi (Go away Modi)
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, during his speech in an election rally in Kerala in May, said that the child death ratio among the the Scheduled Tribes in Kerala is worse that that in Somalia. Keralites, who took offence to this comparison to a “third-world country,” pointed out that the State has the best human development indices in the country and coined the term ‘Po Mone Modi’, inspired from actor Mohanlal’s often-repeated dialogues ‘Po Mone Dinesha’, to dismiss the statements made by the PM as unwarranted.
4. #Avanodoppam (With him)
The ‘Avanodoppam’ hashtag, which has been trending for the past week, is in essence a counter to the ‘Avalkoppam’ (with her) hashtag that was created to show support to the female Malayalam actor who was sexually assaulted in a moving car in Kochi on February 17. Malayalam actor Dileep was arrested in connection to this incident and kept in judicial custody for 85 days before he was released on bail on October 3. When it looked as if the controversy will affect the release of his movie ‘Ramaleela’, a few prominent directors and fraternity members coined the hashtag ‘avanodoppam’ to show solidarity to the accused. This was later picked up by the male actor’s fans as well.
5. #Neyyappam
This hashtag was trending in May 2016, when the Google sought to crowd-source names for the new version of their Android Operating System. Malayali netizens decided that the new version, starting with N, should be named ‘neyyappam’, a delicacy from Kerala made of rice and jaggery, and unleashed a vigorous campaign for the same. Before long, even the Kerala Tourism department took to Twitter to urge members to vote for the name.
6. #Kummanadi
During the inauguration of the Kochi Metro, photos of BJP State President Kummanam Rajasekharan travelling with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and the Governor of Kerala on the maiden trip were widely shared on social media. Netizens pointed out that the BJP State president’s name was not given in the list of the dignitaries who were attending, and that he had not been invited. In no time, enterprising trolls coined the term ‘Kummanadi’ (inspired from the leader’s name). Though the PM’s office later confirmed that Mr. Rajasekharan had indeed been invited, the term became a widely popular slang for the act of travelling without a ticket or gate-crashing an event.
7. #Amittadi
A spin-off of a spin-off, ‘Amittadi’ (inspired by ‘Kummanadi’) started trending a few days ago, when Amit Shah cut short his scheduled appearance in the ‘Jana Raksha Yatra’ in Pinarayi, Kannur, amid reports of lukewarm response to the rally. Malayalees use this latest addition to their urban lexicon to describe someone who chickens out on commitments or runs away in the middle of something.
