The Sabarimala Ayyappa devotees had bad time faced by Kerala police in Nilakkal near Sabarimala. The police vandalized devotee’s parked vehicles and some had stolen branded helmets from the bikes parked near.
The gates of Kerala’s Sabarimala temple were opened this evening for the first time since the Supreme Court allowed women of all ages to enter the shrine. However, no devotee woman from the “banned” age group – 10 to 50 years are tried to visit Lord Ayyappa’s temple yet.
Some activist is come to make communal valance in the state but they could make it to Lord Ayyappa’s temple amid protests done by the Ayyappa devotees till the day.
Ayyappa devotees, including elderly women, first blocked the activists and asked them to stop right there, at Nilakkal, the base camp and the main entrance to Sabarimala, which is about 20 km from the hilltop temple.
The Kerala police personnel had attacked very badly with batons to demolish the unity of Ayyappa devotees. As part of the police master plan, they started to vandalise devotees parked vehicles too.
Video footage has emerged in which the policemen can be seen taking out their anger on vehicles parked on the side of the trek.
They push stationary motorcycles to the ground and even smash their rear-view mirrors and bike with sticks. An auto-rickshaw was also attacked as a big group of police personnel, some of them in protective gear, carrying shields, passed through Pamba at the base of Sabarimala.
18 devotees have filed a case against the Kerala police to smash their bikes at Nilakkal.
Kerala Sair Service Society (NSS) president G.Sukumaran Nair offered all legal supports for the Ayyappa devotees.
At Nilakkal, the police lathicharged Ayyappa devotees in the evening and 3500 devotees including former Travancore Devaswom Board president Prayer Gopalakrishnan were taken into police custody till today.
Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and his party have a strong stand to break the traditional customs at Sabarimala, for that the showcase and uphold the Supreme Court order.
The BJP and the Congress have demanded a review of the court order and the left government denied.
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