Comment on the satire and irony in the poem Rice. Chemmanam Chacko is a master satirist who uses his verse to protest against the evils in the society. He always pokes fun at our own mistakes with his sharp lampoon. The poem Rice is a good example for his attack on people’s vices. The poet derides the farmers who switched their crop preference and thus brought out a devastating change in the culture, tradition, life style and more than all ecological balance.The poem has two parts. In the first part the speaker expresses his longing to return his home. On his way back in the train, his mind glides through the nicest things waiting for him in his native place. The sweetest expectation among them is the athikira rice which his mother cooks. He has already fed up with eating chapathies in North India. Hence rice becomes nostalgia for him. But everything changes drastically when he comes back. This is the point in the second part of the poem.Paddy fields are replaced by rubber plantations. There are no more palm thatched houses. His father wears a contented look while fixing machines to make rubber sheets. His brother brings home wheat supplied through public distribution system. His father explains that they have stopped working on all the rice. It was quite inconvenient. Farmers gain nothing from paddy cultivation. Only fools turn to rice. Rubber has huge money prospects.Here the poet criticizes the attitudes of Keralites towards paddy cultivation. He scorns them as they forget their land and its scent. They are no more willing to sweat in the fields. They become money minded. Even the government does not take any measures to make _ our traditional agricultural system profitable. Instead Chief Minister goes to the centre like an arrow to clamour for more grains. The poet openly condemns that here no one promotes the farming of rice.The poet concludes the poem with the question whether we get some husk from the centre to make toys with it. This question is not put for enquiry, but for ridiculing the sad state of affairs in Kerala. The poet employs irony and satire to expose our follies. Thus Chemmanam Chacko’s Rice is a strong reaction to the mistakes committed by the contemporary Malayalee.