THE WELL AT THUVOOR Mass murder of Hindus during the MAPPILA RIOT On the barren hillside between Thuvoor

r and Karuvayakandi in north Kerala, there is a well. Beside it, on the barren hilltop, on September 25 , 1921 Chambrassery Imbichi Koithangal along with more than 4,000 of his followers had organised a massive rally. Under the solitary tree on the hillside stood Thangal and surveyed the 40 or so people who cowered before him, their hands tied behind their backs. All of them were Hindus. The charge against them was read out. According to the mob, these Hindus had connived with the army against the Muslim extremists who were fighting for an Islamic state in north-Malabar. Thirty three of the Hindus were given death punishment. The first three were shot to death on the spot. The rest were taken to the nearby well one after the other, like lambs in a slaughter-house. The executioner stood near the well. There, each of the Hindus was made to bend and was held down. Then the axeman started his gruesome task. Most of the Hindus were beheaded and their bodies were thrown into the well. Some of them did not die instantly but were thrown into the well mortally wounded. The well was hewn out of solid rock. There was no wall around it. Those who survived the fall were to die a slow agonising death among the bloody corpses. Three days after the bloodbath people could hear cries from the well but were too terrified to help. Anyone who comes to visit the place can see the horrible remains. The well bottom is filled with the skeletons of the dead. The massacre at Thuvoor was only one of the incidents of the Moplah Riot of 1921 in north Kerala. More than 2,500 Hindusmen, women and childrenperished in this infamous incident. About 30,000 Hindus were forcibly converted to Islam. The conversion ceremony included the mandatory eating of beef by the new converts. Two lakh Hindus had to flee their homes. Abduction and rape of Hindu women were widespread. Gandhiji lamented that his Muslim brothers had gone mad in Malabar. Dr B.R. Ambedkar described the Malabar riot as an inhuman uncontrolled savagery. A report on the riot brought out by the Kozhikode District Congress Kerala Committee said that Hindu men, women and children were murdered for the sole reason of being kafirs. The Marxist government led by E.M.S. Namboothiripad twisted the history by classifying the Moplah Riot as a part of the freedom

movement, and today many of those who participated in the riots receive freedom fighter's pension.