38,863 Sq.Kms., 1.18 percent of India, and a name from Keram, the coconut palm

Background

Keralam has completed seventy years as a State, and the Legislature's own profile is where its basic figures are set down. The profile puts the State's area at 38,863 Sq.Kms., a strip of land that curves along the Arabian Sea on India's Southwest Coast. That is 1.18 percent of the country's area, while the State's population of nearly 3.34 crore is 2.76 percent of the country's people. Keralam runs about 590 Kms from north to south, and its width changes from 32 to 120 Kms, so it is a long narrow belt held between the mountains and the sea. The profile traces the name of the land to "Keram", the word for the coconut palm that fills the landscape. It also repeats the legend in which the warrior-sage Parasurama, held to be an avatar of Lord Vishnu, won this land back from the sea with a throw of his battle axe.