Chithralekha: The struggle never ends

 

Two years after the death of Eramangalath Chithralekha, her family is still waiting for justice. Chithralekha, a Dalit woman from Edat near Payyanur in Kannur, spent much of her adult life fighting for something that should never have required such a long battle: the right to work, to live without fear, to have a home and to be treated as an equal citizen. She died of cancer on October 5, 2024, after years of confrontation, protest and uncertainty. Her death brought an end to her personal battle, but not to the difficulties faced by the family she left behind.
An organisation has come forward to help the family by clearing its loan, but the assistance has not yet been finalised, and discussions are still under way. Her daughter, who had worked at Keltron, lost her job during the intense conflict between the family and the CPM in Kannur and now works in a private firm. The family continues to carry the financial and emotional consequences of a fight that began more than two decades ago. Chithralekha’s story therefore cannot be reduced to a political dispute or a confrontation with one party. At its heart was the experience of a Dalit woman who faced caste prejudice, gender discrimination, political power and the denial of livelihood in a society that often takes pride in its progressive credentials.
Chithralekha married Sreeshkanth, a Thiyya, in 2003. They fell in love and began their married life in Edat, an area where the CPM had a strong presence. According to the couple, their difficulties began after the inter-caste marriage. Sreeshkanth spoke of facing a social boycott from members of his own community because he had married a Dalit woman. Chithralekha and her husband also alleged that she was denied access to community water sources and that the family was subjected to hostility because of the marriage.
The question of livelihood soon became another major source of conflict. In 2004, Chithralekha bought an autorickshaw and began driving it for a living. She alleged that CITU-affiliated auto drivers prevented her from operating from the stand, abused her and targeted her because she was a Dalit woman. Her autorickshaw was set on fire on December 31, 2005. When she obtained another autorickshaw with public support, oppositio

n to her work continued.
She refused to give up. She complained to the authorities, protested and sought legal and administrative intervention. At one point, she staged a 122-day protest in front of the Kannur Collectorate demanding the right to earn a livelihood. She later undertook another prolonged protest in front of the state Secretariat. Her family alleged that they were repeatedly attacked and harassed, eventually forcing them to leave Edat and move into rented accommodation in the Kannur area.
The circumstances surrounding her displacement became a matter of government intervention. In 2015, the Oommen Chandy-led UDF government sanctioned land and financial assistance for the construction of a house after considering the circumstances that had forced Chithralekha and her family to leave their native place. But the house itself became another chapter in the dispute. After the change of government, the LDF government sought to cancel the allotment, citing another piece of land in her name. Chithralekha challenged the decision in court, and contemporary reports said the family ultimately obtained legal relief and continued with the house.
For Chithralekha, however, the issue was never simply about a piece of land or an autorickshaw. Her experience raised a much larger and uncomfortable question about the distance between political ideals and lived reality. The CPM and the Left movement have historically spoken of equality, class justice and the rights of the oppressed. Chithralekha’s experience, as she and her family described it, brought a difficult contradiction into view: what happens when a Dalit woman encounters exclusion and discrimination in a social and political environment dominated by a movement that publicly claims to stand for equality?
That question must be considered in the context of her own allegations and experience rather than as a judgement on an entire political movement. Yet it cannot simply be dismissed. Chithralekha continued to insist that caste mattered, that being a Dalit woman shaped the way she was treated and that political power could become another barrier when it was aligned with local social structures. Her confrontation was therefore not merely about the right to drive an autorickshaw. It was about whether a woman from a historically oppressed community could exercise an ordinary economic and social right without having to negotiate the prejudices and power structures surrounding her.
Even after she secured a home, the conflict did not disappear. In 2023, her autorickshaw was set on fire again. Chithralekha protested beside the charred vehicle, refusing to allow the destruction to become another reason for silence. In 2024, when an organisation helped her obtain another autorickshaw, she and her husband alleged that they were still being prevented from operating freely in Kannur. The auto was eventually confiscated. By then, she was seriously ill with cancer. Yet illness did not make her withdraw from the fight. She continued to speak about what had happened to her and to connect her own experience with the wider questions of caste and gender discrimination.

Her story eventually attracted attention beyond Kerala. British art dealer and scriptwriter Fraser Scott began researching her life for a proposed Hindi feature film. He spent more than 500 hours researching the story and wrote a screenplay based on the larger issues he saw in it: caste discrimination, gender inequality and the denial of livelihood. The proposed film did not materialise during Chithralekha’s lifetime. It is not sure if it will be realised at all. The screenplay, however, remains an indication of how her personal experience came to be understood as part of a much larger Indian story.
There is a tendency to remember people like Chithralekha through the dramatic images of their protests: the woman beside a burnt autorickshaw, the long days outside government offices, the confrontation with political workers and the fight over a house. But such images can also obscure the ordinary life she was trying to secure. She wanted to work and support her family. She wanted a home. She wanted to live in the place where she had made her life. She wanted to be able to move through public space without being treated differently because she was a Dalit woman. None of these demands was extraordinary. What was extraordinary was the length to which she had to go to claim them.
That is perhaps the most disturbing aspect of her story. Chithralekha did not set out to become a symbol of caste discrimination or political resistance. Circumstances made her one. Every attempt to establish an ordinary life became another point of confrontation. The autorickshaw became a question of caste and livelihood. The house became a question of political power and displacement. Her marriage became a question of social exclusion. Even when she was battling cancer, her right to work remained contested.
Two years after her death, the family is still living with the consequences of that long battle. An organisation has offered to clear the family’s loan, but the assistance is yet to be finalised. Her daughter has had to rebuild her working life after losing her job at Keltron. Political circumstances have changed, but the family says that the justice Chithralekha sought remains incomplete. The fact that she is no longer alive to make the demand herself should not make that demand any less urgent.
Chithralekha’s life deserves to be remembered not simply as a story of confrontation with the CPM, nor only as the story of a woman who fought to drive an autorickshaw. It was a sustained assertion of dignity by a Dalit woman who refused to accept that caste, gender or political influence should determine her right to work and live freely. Her experience also forces Kerala to look beyond its reputation as a progressive society and ask whether equality is meaningful when it does not reach everyday life.
Chithralekha spent nearly two decades insisting on rights that should have been hers without a fight: the right to work, to marry the person she chose, to live in her own home and to be treated as an equal. She died before she could see the full consequences of the battle she had fought. Her family is still carrying them. Until the family’s financial and legal uncertainties are resolved and the questions raised by her life are confronted honestly, her story cannot be considered closed. The struggle did not end with Chithralekha’s death; it continues in the life of the family she left behind and in the unfinished question her experience places before a society that claims equality as one of its deepest values.