Wake up on a mist-softened morning in Kerala. The sun has not yet risen above the palms. It has just touched the backwaters with silver. And yet, hurrying down the little paths, being put-putted in auto-rickshaws, on the pillions of cycles and scooters, in large buses: the children of Kerala, all in crisp uniforms, are going to school. Kerala needs no Truant Officers, as they have in some, so-called. First World countries. Education is free all the way up to university. And education is a compulsion with all Malayalees.

With education comes literacy. Drawing on the Malayalee's magnificent obsession with education, the Government of Kerala launched an incredibly ambitious programme. It motivated every Malayalee, particularly the young people of Kerala, to ferret out and teach the few Malayalees, particularly the elderly, who did not know how to read and write. Significantly, it offered no financial incentives to the 'teachers', only teaching aids.

Powered by the urge to make Kerala the first totally literate state in India, literacy classes blossomed all over the state. It wasn't long before the state government announced that its adult literacy drive had been amazingly successful. Every single person in Kerala can read and write.

Kerala's Christians, spurred by their need to read the Bible, have been responsible for giving the initial impetus to literacy and education in Kerala, but then it became a chain reaction with every community joining in and refusing to be left behind. There are 118 daily newspapers in Malayalam in Kerala, and 125 weeklies. Its Malayala Manorama is the largest selling daily in India, its Malayala Manorama Weekly is the largest selling weekly, and its Manorama Year Book in English is the largest selling publication of its kind. Its exposure to TV is twice as much as the Indian average and TV, in our land, covers an estimated 82 per cent of the population.

Thus, Malayalees are very aware of happenings in the world around them. Ideas are the fuels which propel Kerala. In a state once so riven by social stratification that a religious reformer said that Kerala was a mad-house of caste, the idea of equality fired Malayalee minds. Communism promised equality and so Kerala, reputedly, became the world's first state to accept Communism through democratic means. And also voted out in the same way!

The strong civic awareness, which seems to be an essential feature of the Malayalee psyche led to the birth of Kerala's co-operative stores and marketing ventures: among the most successful anywhere: Kerala's stress on equal opportunities for women has also led to great achievements by the women of this progressive state. The first woman to become a Justice of our Supreme Court is a Malayalee. So is the first woman Magistrate, Sessions Judge, High Court Judge: Mrs. Anna Chandy. The first woman officer of the Indian Administrative Service is a Malayalee, so is the first woman Chief Engineer and the first woman Director of Animal Husbandry.

But more than such peak achievements is the fact that Kerala's women have had an enormous impact on the socio-economic profile of their state. Kerala owes a great debt to its clear thinking women.

In the 1970's, for instance, a Malayaiee administrator launched an intensive family planning drive. His target was the well-informed, and largely independent, women of Kerala. His message was that if they had fewer children, better fed and better educated, they would not have to become baby factories to safeguard against infant mortality. The fact that Kerala already had a very successful public health system added to the force of his message. Moreover, an international survey had, at about that time, also claimed that the quality of life enjoyed by Malayalees was as high as that of many Europeans. In spite of the seeming poverty of many of the people of Kerala their basic needs of food, clothing, shelter, health and education had been met and their aspirations were rising.

Such a message might not have reached many women in India but because the women of Kerala had such high levels of literacy and awareness, the message arrowed into every home. Malayaiee women opted, overwhelmingly, for smaller families and even better lives. And with the force of their conviction they took their men to the Family Planning Camps.

Having achieved this, Malayaiee women raised their sights even higher. In their quest fora better life for their families in the years that followed, they pawned their jewellery and encouraged their men to seek their fortunes in the Gulf. The great building boom in the oil-rich Gulf states has brought prosperity to a great number of Malayaiee families.

"When the Gulf boom petered out, and the men returned home, most of them had the capital, and the experience, to strike out on their own."

And the industry which most suited their sense of independence, their new-found confidence in inter-acting with people of all nationalities, and their desire to improve their lifestyles, was tourism.

Kerala, with its superb mix of festivals, food, handicrafts and dance seems to be tailor-made for the tourists of the world.

Somewhere in Kerala, every night, the gods and goddesses, sages, demons and fabulous creatures live again. Under the bright stars, and beneath the rustle of palms, men, women and children sit encaptured.

On a stage, magniHed bv their moving shadows, the masters of Kathakali, in bright and voluminous robes, their faces made super-human by stylised make-up,strutand turnwithstately tred. Drums roll,cymbalsclash,and the voice of the singer conjures up the reversed tales of epic and fantasy.

The dancers' identification with their cnaracu-rs is as cumplete as is that of any great actor on a modern stage. With this difference. The dramas performed in Kathakali are based on beliefs thousands of years old; they are as much a part of the reality of the audience as the air thev breathe and the blood pounding in their veins.

This epic drama's roots go tar back. into the past. It grew from folk dances and, possibly, spirit-dances, it evolved through a physical depletion of revered tables for a pre-literate people and took. on elements of the martial arts. It absorbed the grace of the high sophisticated Sanskrit dance form of Bharat Natyam and was transformed into a vehicle to transiate the' epics of this classical language into a common-person's idiom.

According to the late Dr. J. H. Cousins, Art Advisor to the Govt. of Travancore, Head of the DepL oi' Fine Arts ol the Umversilv of Travancore - 'Kathakali gathered into itself elements from all tlw phases ot the past - the religious intention, Puranic reperloireand humorous injections of th kuthu; the opening dedication from the C;ita Covinda; the costuming of the Krishnattam; the gestures of the Raimanattam'.

Today, Kathakali is a highly stylised but an extraordinarily evocative art which combines chant, drama, dance, make-lip, divss and gesture into a package that spins a compelling spell.

There is little point for a visitor to try grasp what all the movements gestures mean. According to experts there are 24 prnnarv hand and fineer gestures which give 404 signs, 40 secondary once indicating 55 signs: a manual code of 459 signs. Then there are movements of the head and neck, the arms and hands, the eyes and eyebrows, the lips, teeth, tongue, feet and toes. All these must be read together as words must be read in sentences, correctly punctuated, and sentences in paragraphs before the meaning can be distilled.

The best way to appreciate a Kathakah pertormance is to have that particular dance-drama explained to you in advance Get a clear idea of the story and a reasonably good idea of the gestures arid movements that the dancers will use to tell the story. And then sit back and let the performance take over. You'll soon find that the drums and the clashing cymbals provide a sort of audio curtain which excludes the outside world and allows the performer to make an almost sub-liminal contact with your mind.

Kathakali is as classical as western opera, ballet Shakespearean drama and Japanese Noh. Thullal is as entertamingly satirical as a Christmas pantomime. Thullal was created in the 18th century bv Kunchan Nambiar. He used ribaldry, ridicule and rhyme, drawing on classical tales to highlight contemporary hypocrisies. Thus you'll find the audience roaring with laughter and clapping at every sally of a Thullal performer and its often worth attending one for the audience reaction alone But if you can find someone to give you an instant translation, a skill which is fairly common in Kerala, you'll probably find yourself roaring too... though a shade out of phase.

Far more culture-bridging, because it depicts emotions in ways which are universally understood, is Mohiniallam-. the Dance of the Enchantress. Originally this was a form which had been developed by dancing girls, and, possibly, courtesans. At one time professional dancing girls were considered to be courtesans. In the 1800s, the multi-talented ruler of Travancore State, Swati Tirunal, reshaped this dance form by incorporating into it some of the simpler, and more easily understood, facets of the classical Bharat Natyam along with some of the gestures of Kathakali.

An evening of Kathakali is a very gripping one. An evening of Mohiniattam is very relaxing, very enjoyable and, for many visitors, delightfully stimulating: as, indeed, all good entertainment should be.

The most unusual blend of cultural influences can be seen in the Christian dance-drama: Chavittu 'Natakam. It has an interesting history.

When the Portuguese came to Kerala, they wanted to create a vehicle to spread the myths and legends they held in reverence. It is more than likely that they were impressed with the gripping power of Kathakali but they obviously felt that it would be unwise to graft their legends onto the Kathakali dance drama. Clearly, the most obvious solution was to create a distinctive dance drama of their own. This is exactly what they did.

Collaborating with Malayalee scholars they produced librettos which extolled the heroic exploits of legendary Christian warriors. Their choice of warriors was probably conditioned by the need to project European fighters in a favourable light. They possibly hoped that some of the might and awe conjured up by these larger-than-life figures would then be transferred to them. Thus one has the enchanting spectacle of Charlemagne and his Paladins strutting the stage, declaiming in fluent Malayalam... the language of Kerala... while opposing sundry villains such as Saladin. Some students of this art form tend to say that Saladin was introduced in later centuries because the Portuguese could not have been guilty of such an anachronism: Saladin was born more than 300 years after Charlemagne died. But as these librettos could have been conceived more as morality plays than historical ones, the moral of the triumph of Christian warriors were more important than historical accuracy.

In Chavittu Natakarn there are a large number of characters all in glittering medieval dress. They sing their lines loudly and with exaggerated gestures and they stamp their feet with great force on the wooden stage. Chavittu Natakarn literally means the 'Stamping Drama'. One is not likely, however, to see the stage reduced to matchwood as, apparently, used to happen when more militant actors trod... or rather, stamped on... the stage.

Happily, there are also a number of gentler art-forms in Kerala. One of these is the hand-clapping, circular folk dance called Kaikottikali with which girls and women celebrate the Onam Festival.