Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi has agreed to urgently hear on Friday a plea by the two women who managed to enter the Sabarimala temple in the thick of violent protests, for protection of their lives.
Senior advocate Indira Jaising, representing Bindu and Kanakadurga of Kerala, said the women should be provided safer haven at a secret address so that no threat against them would turn into a reality.
The petition said women of every age should be allowed to enter the temple without "any let or hindrance, without danger to life ans liberty and to ensure security and safe passage, police security to women wishing to enter Sabarimala temple in future".
It said the temple authorities should "not conduct the rite of purification or shut down the temple". Such reactions from the temple authorities violated the fundamental rights of life, dignity, freedom of religion and freedom from discrimination of women.
Ms. Jaising said one of the two women was scared for their lives and one of them was even attacked at her home.
The women were reportedly the first to break the cordon of protesters who had camped along the pilgrimage trail and physically prevented women from entering the temple during this Mandala-Makaravilakku season that ended on January 14.
Over 40 petitions to be heard
The apex court, on September 28, lifted the bar on women of menstrual age from undertaking the pilgrimage to the famed forest temple.
The women's plea has come even as a scheduled hearing on January 22 by a five-judge Bench led by Chief Justice Gogoi may not sit, as one of the judges, Justice Indu Malhotra, is on leave. The Bench was supposed to hear over 40 petitions and applications seeking a review of the September 28 verdict.
In December, the Kerala government itself moved the Supreme Court, accusing “right- wing outfits” of openly flouting the judgment allowing women aged between 10-50 years by physically obstructing women pilgrims, threatening them with physical danger and abusing them in the “filthiest language”.
The State government said it was constitutionally bound to implement the judgment which quashed Rule 3(b) of the Kerala Hindu Places of Public Worship (Authorisation of Entry) Rules of 1965, which barred menstrual women from undertaking the pilgrimage. It had said protesters were “camouflaged” as pilgrims.
“Even women who have crossed 50 years were physically assaulted and obstructed by the unruly persons who came as devotees,” the State government contended.
Board seeks time to implement verdict
Recently, the Travancore Devsawom Board also moved the Supreme Court, saying that about 1,000 women had registered their names to visit the temple and the Board cannot ensure their security against the "acts of hooliganism and assault" wrecked by protesters and certain political parties in and around the Sabarimala premises.
The Board had sought more time to implement the judgment. It said that even the "unprecedented" efforts of the police to provide security to women pilgrims aged between 10 and 50 years, who have tried to enter temple, were overawed by the protesters.
