Another Anthem: Rhyme & Reason of a Resistance

EDAN means hunter in Malayalam. Recall that Valmiki, the author of the Ramayana, once referred to as Ratnakara, was also a hunter.

- C P SURENDRAN

In Kerala, where just about every other person you run into is either a professor or a poet—and, unreasonably, often both—the man making waves with his music is a rap artiste: Hirandas Murali, or Vedan, as he likes to call himself. A slender man in his early 20s with eyes bright as bulbs, a funky hairstyle, and skin dark as the night that befalls the forest.

Vedan's viewership runs into millions. Never has social media technology been so keenly weaponized to subvert the caste system in the curated progressivism of a narcissistic state. Even better, in a country that is now competing to take credit for the caste census, Vedan shows the way. He is not begging for mercy or appealing for justice, but rapping out a code of power in his art. He is what psychologists call "resourced"—resourced enough to start a cultural war.

On April 30, a district court in Kerala granted Vedan bail in a wildlife case—he wore a "tiger tooth" as a locket—citing a weak prima facie case pending forensic analysis of the "tiger tooth"; gifted, Vedan says, by a fan. Earlier in the week, he had been arrested for possession of 6 grams of cannabis. Conditions included a ₹50,000 bond, passport surrender and weekly check-ins. There was also a cache of ₹9.5 lakh in cash in his apartment.

Emerging into sunlight, Vedan spoke with Valmiki-like resolve: "I'm trying to be better," he said, apologizing to young fans for his narcotics use. "These aren't good habits."