Thiruvananthapuram : , Saturday, December 11, 2011: The Kerala government gave green light to all Sabarimala pilgrims on Saturday for a holy bath before they climb uphill to get darshana of Lord Ayyappa starting Sunday at Sabarimala temple.
The two-month long temple season that began on November 16 will end in the third week of January 2022 with a few days break in the last week of December.
Until now, this season, the holy dip was not permitted and there were various restrictions but since the season began, the relaxations are being eased with another directive that came on Saturday that pilgrims can now take any route they wish.Till now only one route was open.
These restrictions were lifted after K.Radhakrishnan, the State Devasom Minister, met with Pinarayi Vijayan, Chief Minister.
Pilgrims can now remain at the temple hilltop for 12 hours and rooms will also be given to the needy.
Earlier this week, the ‘tantri’ of the temple, Kantarar Mahesh Mohanaru expressed the hope that things will soon fall in place so that all traditional rituals at the temple take place.
It has been agreed that the maximum daily devotees will be limited to 30,000.All spots must either be pre-booked, or booked at the counters.
According to the temple authorities, by now more than 1.6 million pilgrims have pre-booked their temple visit.
The Kerala government has come out with a fresh directive exempting all children below 10 years from a Covid test (RT-PCR) to visit the temple.
However, the directive stated that adults should accompany children to ensure they follow Covid protocol.They must use sanitizer and wear masks.
The order said that the adults are accountable for the children’s health issues.
Pilgrims above 10 years must either carry a negative RT-PCR test report taken prior to 72 hours or must have taken both the vaccine jabs.
Since 2018, the Sabarimala Temple, the largest earner of the Travancore Devasom Board, that manages this temple as well as other temples within the south Kerala district, has experienced a difficult festival season.
While the previous season was badly affected by Covid-19, this time, after the season opened, more than Rs 22 crore has come by way of offerings and sale of “appom” and “aravana” (payasem) as the “prasad”.
sg/khz/bg
#Devotees #allowed #holy #Sabarimala #temple #Kerala #Malayalam #Mollywood #Kerala #Thiruvananthapuram #Covid #Covid-19
.
