The base camps of Pamba and Nilackal witnessed intensified protests as the Lord Ayyappa temple opened for the five-day monthly pooja this evening, for the first time after the landmark top court verdict.
Section 144 (prohibits assembly of more than 4 people in an area) has been imposed in Pampa, Nilakkal, Sannidhanam, and Elavungal.
Devaswom minister Kadakampally Surendran has demanded that national leadership of RSS should involve to settle the attacks at Sabarimala. He said that RSS criminals are behind these attacks and they will be stopped immediately. He was talking to reporters after the review meet held at Sabarimala.
Women journalists were heckled, their vehicles smashed and young female Ayyappa devotees turned back as hordes of Hindu right activists besieged the road leading to the Sabarimala temple whose gates open for women of menstrual age Wednesday evening for the first time after the Supreme Court’s verdict.
The political slugfest over the Kerala government’s decision not to file a review petition against the apex court order also escalated as tempers frayed in areas surrounding the hill shrine that were on edge.
Activist Rahul Easwar, a front-ranking leader of the protesters and votary of continuance of the tradition barring girls and women between 10 and 50 years from entering the temple, a custom which the Supreme Court overturned on September 28, was arrested at Pamba at the foothill from where the trek to the shrine begins.
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