There is a total slump in farming activity due to multifarious other factors viz. deficiency of farm labour, vagaries of weather, cost effect etc- RK Kutty Apropos of EM Adityan, Edapal (Kerala') letter 'Programme for the Month of Feb 2008' (CC 5/2/09). Though, people like me living outside of Kerala see the daily development there only through the Television channels, print media or other sources, yet, what Adityan now wrote through his letter can be taken as an eyewitness account and though he wrote satirically, it dispels all the doubts in our minds that things are really pathetic for the people of the State. The State that was quite self-sufficient in agricultural products, milk, vegetable and others now seem to be totally dependent on neighboring States like Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh for almost all daily use items like rice, vegetables, milk and various other food products. Very recently, the Food and Civil Supplies Minister C Divakaran had to literally beg his counterpart of the State of Tamil Nadu to release milk and rice to Kerala as the State-run Milma Dairy expressed its inability to supply daily requirement of milk to the public, more due to short supply from TN and very specifically due to financial crisis that the Dairy Corporation faces by supplying milk at the current rate. Also, since the price of rice was increasing alarmingly and that too was due to non-supply of Champa rice from Tamil Nadu, the State Minister had to plead with his TN counterpart to release more quota of rice to the State to tide over the situation. What is wrong with the State? Is anyone carefully examining the ground reality? It was already written many a time in the past that paddy fields in the State have been criminally levelled to make way for the construction of more palatial houses for the new affluent as a consequence of the Gulf, US and other European immigration of large number of Keralites. Since they are earning hefty sums, their relatives at home prefer to do nothing but only enjoy life, watching the 24x7 relay of serials, mimicries, Mohanlal & Mammooty stared films and other variety entertainment programmes dished out through various channels. Even in the case of other men folk working outside the State, their families too prefer to enjoy life depending on the inflow of money. There is a total slump in farming activity due to multifarious other factors viz. deficiency of farm labour, vagaries of weather, cost effect et al. Therefore, paddy fields over-night is levelled and mansions come up in its place. There are lots of construction activity and for that too labourers are brought from Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and even Bihar and West Bengal. These people find the State a mines-field as they get more income in comparison to their own home States. But, one of the disturbing trends reported on a daily basis is that there are lots of thefts, house-breaking and even murder as the out of State labourers keep watch on the affluent house-holds, inhabited only by the aged men/women folk. The Left front government under octogenarian leader VS Achutanandan is dead-locked in one controversy or the other, both from within his own party vis-a -vis the vigilant opposition UDF under Oommen Chandy. The CM, who was earlier leading a crusade against large scale industrialization and violently opposing Smart cities and IT parks, is now concentrating his mind only in such mega developmental projects. He is now enmeshed in a controversy over an IT park to come up on government/PSU HMT owned land at Kalamassery, Alwaye. All the details of EM Adityan's 'Programmes for the month of Feb 2008' exemplify the bandh, hartal or others of nuisance value, mostly chartered by the political parties of both the ruling as well as the opposition in which people, who have no work, whatsoever, or who are slack, enjoying on the hard-earned money from expatriates, are the participants. It is a curse that a highly literate, prosperous State is now reducing itself to the level of a laughing stock before the whole country; unmindful of the trap they are entering in, slow and steady, in the form of increased dependence for their daily use items on other States, with whom too they have strained relations. It is high time to reverse this trend for good.