Lack of administrative acumen, co-ordination in the Travancore Devaswom Board and absence of board authorities to monitor and co-ordinate the functioning of the TDB machinery as well as various agencies involved in the conduct of the annual Mandalam-Makaravilakku festival began to affect the annual pilgrimage season at Sabarimala.
Ayyappa devotees have been put to inconveniences and hardship owing to lack of facilities and proper informations regarding the arrangements being made by the temple administration in connection with the annual pilgrimage season.
Pilgrims coming from different parts of the country appear to have been a confused lot as the TDB has demolished a number of pilgrim shelters and closed down a good number of eateries and shops, besides denying permission to certain devotees’ organisations from outside Kerala who have been conducting Annadanam (free feeding of devotees) at Sabarimala since the past few years, in the name of providing more open space for viewing the Makarajyoti and ease human pressure at the holy hillock.
Ironically, the TDB has done this with out making any alternative arrangement to address the pilgrims’ basic needs for food, shelter and drinking water, ultimately leaving the Ayyappa devotees at the receiving end.
Various Government departments as well as different TDB wings appear to have been acting on their own at Sabarimala, disregarding the dire need for a healthy co-ordination among themselves for the smooth conduct of the annual pilgrim season.
TDB president, M.Rajagopalan Nair, has been hospitalised in Thiruvananthapuram due to illness. Ms K.Cicily, and Padmanabhan, both board members and the Devaswom Commissioner N.Vasu have left Sabarimala after addressing a series of meetings and press conferences on the very first day of the pilgrim season itself on November 17.
New exit route unutilised
The High Power Committee (HPC) chaired by Additional Chief Secretary, K.Jayakumar, has constructed the new road-cum-Bailey Bridge linking Malikappuram with the Chandranandan Road, spending Rs 2.3 crore, as part of the Sabarimala Master Plan. But, many pilgrims, especially those coming from outside Kerala, are not aware of it owing to the failure on the part of the authorities concerned in promptly diverting the pilgrims through the new exit road. Many experts who have shared their concern over the sad state of affairs at Sabarimala with The Hindu were of the opinion that ``this kind of official indifference towards making the pilgrims utilise the newly introduced facilities at Sabarimala has been a major problem confronting the smooth conduct of the annual pilgrimage.’’
Pilgrims were ill-informed or rather kept in the dark on the changed locations of eateries and Annadanam centres at the Sannidhanam. The Chennai-based Paropakar Group that had been conducting Annadanam, serving food and health drinks, to as many as 25,000 people on a daily basis during the past five years was denied space for continuing their charity work this year. TDB has even demolished the building that housed its Annadanam hall a few weeks before the beginning of the pilgrim season. Even the Akhila Bharatha Ayyappa Seva Sanghom that has been conducting Annadanam in a praiseworthy manner at the holy hillock since the past several years was forced to shift their dining hall to an inconvenient site.
Various departments attached to both TDB and the Government are blaming each other for their own flaws and failures in ensuring better care and facility to the pilgrims at Sabarimala.
Hawkers and beggars too began to resurface at several points along the trekking path, despite the ban on it.
Though Kerala High Court has been acting as a corrective force, taking serious note of various issues facing the pilgrim centre from time to time, some sort of an administrative delay continue to plague the TDB administration for reasons best known to the authorities concnerned.
Sabarimala development authority mooted
The Pandalam Palace Managing Committee president P.Ramavarma Raja, Sabarimala Ayyappa Seva Samajom general secretary Kummanam Rajashekharan, and several other prominent citizens have stressed the need to set up an independent administrative body or a Sabarimala Development Authority with statutory powers to ensure a well streamlined and foolproof temple administration as well as smooth conduct of the annual pilgrim season.
Justice Chandrashekharan Menon Commission that inquired into the Pampa Hilltop stampede tragedy of 1999 too has recommended for a separate administrative mechanism for Sabarimala. Though the Commission report was submitted to the Government on June 7, 2000, neither the same nor the Action Taken Report on it has been discussed in the Assembly, so far.
