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| A poster of "Ennu Ninte Moideen" showing Moideen and Kanchanamala (left) along with Prithviraj and Parvathy, who play the lead roles (Video of trailer below) |
Malayalam movie Ennu Ninte Moideen. which captures the tragic love story of Moideen, a Muslim youth, and Kanchanamala, a Hindu woman, released outside Kerala on October 2.
Driven by word-of-mouth buzz, the movie is one its way to become one of all-time hits of Kerala cinema. The movie has gained over Rs 10 crore in the first nine days, an impressive feat for a Malayalam movie.
K S Shaji wrote a story in Open magazine in 2009, basing it on the Hindu-Muslim forbidden love as it played out in a conservative Kerala town Mukkom, in Kozhikode district,
She was the daughter of a Hindu landlord, he the son of a prominent Muslim planter. They were childhood friends, who studied in the same school, grew up playing and studying together. And they fell in love.
Their relationship was found out and both the families successfully separated them physically, but failed to wipe out their devotion to each other.
Kanchanamala was placed under house arrest for years, while Moideen was disowned by his family. His father shot at him and stabbed him 22 times, though Moideen survived these separate incidents of murderous attacks.
Moideen and Kanchanamala refused to elope not wanting to shame their families but nor did they marry anyone else. Moideen's family eventually took him back and he made a name for himself in social work before tragically drowning, while heroically trying to save victims of a boat accident. He was 44 then and Kanchanamala was 41.
A few years down Moideen's mother took Kanchanamala home to live as her dead bachelor son's widow. Shaji's story is titled - The widow of a bachelor.
Kanchanamala even got Moideen's share of property, which she uses to continue the social work started by him.
The river Iruvanji still flows close by. But in the last six decades Kanchanamala has not gone near it,