Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) State president P.S. Sreedharan Pillai has said that the party, while continuing to support the devotees’ agitation for protection of the custom related to the Sabarimala temple, will also demand reinstatement of the rights of tribal communities such as the Malayarayans over the temple.
Addressing the media after convening a meeting of the State leadership of the party here on Thursday, Mr. Pillai said the Travancore Devaswom Board (TDB) had divested the communities of their rights. “Do they have land there now? It was the TDM which took away the Malayarayans’ right related to the Makarajyothy [flame that appears thrice at Ponnambalamedu in the jungle surrounding Sabarimala at the end of the annual pilgrim season],” he said.
He accused the Congress and CPI(M) which alternately governed the State since its formation of being responsible for the loss of the rights of these communities. However, Mr. Pillai chose to keep it vague about exactly what right of the Malayarayans at Ponnambalamedu was taken away by the TDB.
When asked, he said they were shorn of their right to worship there. Asked if his party would demand that their right to perform pujas at the shrine be reinstated, heeding to calls for the same from some members of the community, he said he only meant those rights that were taken away after the formation of the Travancore Devaswom Board (TDB).
“The tantri family [Thazhamon family] has been around for centuries,” he said, adding that 12 sub processions of the Malayarayans would join the ‘rath yatra’ to be taken out by the NDA from Kasaragod for the protection of Sabarimala.
Continuing his onslaught on the CPI(M), he said several people from ‘Communist families’ would come forward in the coming days in support of the believers’ protest on Sabarimala. He accused Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and the CPI(M) of using just ‘an incident of police caning’ to portray Sabarimala as a riot-prone area. “This is with a clear view to destroy the temple.” He said the effort of the ‘Communist government’ was to divest Sabarimala of its uniqueness and convert it into just another Ayyappa temple.
He said regardless of the verdict to be given by the Supreme Court on the review petition against its order allowing entry of women of all age groups to the hill shrine, his party would attempt to attain its goal. Mr. Pillai attacked the Congress for betraying the believers. “I wanted to use the familiar Malayalam word for them, but then transgender people would again take out a march to my house,” he said.
