A social media post that shares excerpts of an alleged conversation between school students and Kerala’s Malappuram district collector Rani Soyamoi is going viral across social media platforms. As per the excerpt, the collector explains the hardships she has gone through in her childhood working in a mica mine. Further, she explains the reason why she does not wear makeup. Through this article, let’s fact-check the veracity of the viral conversation and the story of the collector.
Claim: Real-life story of Malappuram district collector Rani Soyamoi.
Fact: The alleged story attributed to the Malappuram district collector is fictional. It is taken from a Malayali writer Hakeem Morayur’s short story collection ‘Three Women’. Even the name attributed to the collector in the viral post is also taken from the book. Hakeem Morayur himself clarified the same through a Facebook post. On the other hand, the image shared in the post is of Shainamol IAS, who in the past worked as Malappuram collector. Hence the claim made in the post is FALSE.
The story narrated in the name of Malappuram district collector Rani Soyamoi is fictional. It is extracted from a Malayali short story collection written by Hakeem Morayur.
Hakeem Morayur through a Facebook post confirmed that the viral story is extracted from his fictional short story collection ‘Three Women’. The short story titled ‘Shining Faces’ from his book is being shared as a real story in the name of Rani Soyamoi, which also happened to be the name of the main character in his book. He also shared an image of the story from his book to substantiate his claim.
On the other hand, the image shared in the viral post is of Shainamol IAS, who in the past worked as the Malappuram collector (here & here). From all these, it is evident that a fictional story is being shared in the name of the Malappuram district collector.
To sum it up, a fictional story is passed off as real-life incidents of the Malappuram collector.
