For the first time since the Supreme Court order to end the decades-old ban on women of menstrual age entering the shrine, two women below 50 walked into the Sabarimala temple in Kerala before daybreak on Wednesday. The temple has been shut for ritual “purification”.
Bindu and Kanaka Durga, both in their early 40s, entered the hilltop shrine early this morning around 3.45 am. The video shows the women hurrying into the shrine, dressed in all-black and escorted by the police. A group of protesters also appear to be at the spot.
Bindu, 44, is a college lecturer and CPI(ML) activist, according to the Press Trust of India. Kanakadurga, 42, is a civil supplies employee who had come to Sabarimala on December 24 after 11 women activists of a Chennai-based outfit trying to reach the shrine were chased away by devotees chanting Ayyappa mantras.
Both women had tried to visit Sabarimala in the last week of December but had been blocked by massive protests. The temple reopened on December 30 for the Makaravilakku festival and there has been a heavy rush of pilgrims since then.
Priests and many devotees strongly believe that the ban on women between 10 and 50 years should stay as the deity Lord Ayyappa is celibate. On Tuesday, there was more trouble when tens of thousands of women formed a human chain across Kerala state to back the demand for women’s access to the temple. The Supreme Court is to start hearing a legal challenge to its ruling on January 22.
Since the top court overturned the ban on September 28, upholding the constitutional right of every individual to practice their faith, protesters had ensured that women below 50 were unable to enter the shrine. Over a dozen women tried but were stopped by a wall of protesters less than a km from the temple’s entrance.
