They had no particular desire to look “tough” like Hollywood action heroes Bruce Willis or Jason Statham.

Nor had they suddenly “got religion” or felt inspired by Yogi Adityanath — they are, after all, staunch Marxists.

The real reason that many young men have gone shiny pate in a Kerala village is the coronavirus and the lockdown it has triggered. And the bald truth that hair-trimming is not for the amateur.

“With barbershops closed because of the lockdown, a couple of youngsters in the village — next-door neighbours — tried to give each other a haircut. They made a hash of it,” an amused Kanakan, the local barber, told The Telegraph over the phone on Saturday.

So they did the next best thing: shave each other’s heads. The trend caught on. Over the next few days some 25 men, including a couple of schoolboys, went bald in the Kannur village of Mayyil.

Kanakan, who said he himself tonsured a couple of men who live near his home, described the sudden craze for hairlessness as an “accidental trend”.

“Once it started, everyone thought it wasn’t a bad idea after all, particularly since Kerala is so hot and humid this time of year,” he said.

While it’s impossible to maintain social distancing while tonsuring each other, Kanakan said the shaver and the shaved stood as far as possible.

“We know what our chief minister (Pinarayi Vijayan) has been telling us and we follow every bit of it,” he said.

Sounding somewhat embarrassed, Kanakan confessed he had himself joined the baldheads, asking a fellow villager to give him what has come to be known in Mayyil as the “corona cut”.

“All of us are at home with plenty of free time. That’s one of the reasons getting one’s head shaven has caught on in a small village like this,” he said.

Lijil, a villager, decided to lose his hair on Thursday. “I just went ahead after seeing a few others do it,” he chuckled.

“Three others went bald with me. I think more people will join in.”

Kanakan was quick to scotch any suggestion that Mayyil being a “CPM village”, the mass tonsuring might be seen as a protest against the lockdown, or at least against the way it was imposed without preparation.

“We are all CPM families but we support the lockdown, social distancing and all the other protocols since they are for everyone’s safety,” he insisted.

As a professional barber, is he worried that the trend might be here to stay, hitting his earnings even after the lockdown ends?

“Not at all. As I said, this was purely accidental.

Anyway, I get customers from outside the village too,” he said.

Rather, he said, he was glad that people were finding solutions when confronted with a problem.

“We must appreciate the camaraderie of those who helped each other at a time like this,” he said.

Kanakan, though, might have to wait a while for customers even after the lockdown ends. Many may want to stay away from crowded places like barbershops until they are sure the virus has been conclusively defeated.