Entry of women no more the issue in Sabarimala

The state BJP now says that its agitation is not against entry of women, but against the communist government.

Even as four women moved the Kerala High Court seeking two days exclusively for women devotees to pray at the Sabarimala Ayyappa temple, it is becoming increasingly clear that the issue of young women’s entry into the shrine is being pushed to the background for political gains. The state BJP, which has been spearheading the movement against entry of women into the shrine, now says that its Sabarimala agitation is not against entry of women, but against the communist government. “Communists are trying to destroy the temple, our protest is against the communists,” state BJP president P.S. Sreedharan Pillai said on Thursday, adding a new twist to the whole controversy. Since a day has passed and Pillai not contradicted his statement, this will give much ammunition to the government, which had all along contented that the BJP was politicising the Sabarimala issue. More and more irrelevant issues such as alleged police excesses are being dragged into the controversy at the cost of genuine problems like lack of adequate facilities for the devotees en route to the shrine. Earlier Pillai was caught on camera telling party workers that Sabarimala issue was a “golden opportunity” for the party to topple the communist government. At the time he had said that the media had used his comment out of context. But the latest statement is not going to help the BJP in any way. The people of the state are getting tired of the daily disruption in their lives. They have not forgiven BJP for calling a flash strike on the first day of the Malayalam month Vrischigam, when the temple formally opened for the Mandala puja. The latest statement by its president has put the BJP in a very awkward position as far as its role in Sabarimala agitation is concerned.

The four women have approached the court after the state government broached the idea of setting specific days exclusively for women. “We are holding discussion with concerned authorities that whether specific days can be set for women devotees alone,” Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan had said, while addressing a press conference two days ago. Though it is going to be almost two months since the Supreme Court has ruled that women of all ages could enter the temple, no woman has so far made it to the temple for darshan. Immediately after the SC ruling on 28 September, the temple was opened for five days in October and for a day in early November. Both occasions, attempts by a few women, mainly activists, were thwarted by violent protesters who had vowed not to allow any women in the age group of 10-50 enter the temple. Now the shrine has been open from 16 November for over a two-month-long Mandala season, the most auspicious of the pilgrimage to the Ayyappa temple that attracts lakhs of devotees from Kerala, as well as neighbouring states. But even after a week, the flow of pilgrims to the shrine has not picked up compared to previous years, mainly due to the stand-off between the government and the agitators. The presence of thousands of policemen deployed by the authorities to prevent any untoward incidents in and around the shrine also has dissuaded many from their annual pilgrimage. In this one week, young women had not ventured out to the shrine, though the authorities have got applications from over 1,000 women seeking protection while visiting the temple.

The Left Front government’s decision to implement the court order without any consultation with aggrieved parties was first opposed by Hindu sociocultural bodies, especially the Nair Service Society, in the state which saw it as an attempt to violate tradition and faith. The BJP and the Congress who are now in the forefront of the agitation against entry of women had initially welcomed the SC verdict. Among the two, it was the Congress which had always objected to any move in breaking the tradition of the temple. Successive UDF governments led by Congress along with the Devaswom Board, which controls the temple, had filed affidavits opposing entry of women into the temple. The BJP and the RSS had always supported entry of women, so also the LDF led by CPM. But sensing the popular mood in the state against the verdict, the BJP changed its stand and soon wrested the leadership of the agitation as it saw an opportunity to mobilise public opinion against the ruling CPM. As the agitation turned violent and more political in nature, protesters such as the NSS slowly started distancing themselves, at the same time sticking to their stand. They wanted the government to seek more time from the SC to implement the order. However, the BJP, with full support from the RSS, launched a state-wide agitation targeting the government for its “anti-devotee” stand. The Congress soon became irrelevant. By the time the temple opened for Mandala puja, it was clear that there would be large scale violence. But this time the state was more prepared. It imposed various restrictions on the movement of devotees and clamped down on anyone it thought as supporters of the Sangh Parivar out to disrupt peace in the area surrounding the temple. However, the government did not overtly encourage young women to undertake the pilgrimage, putting the BJP in a disadvantageous position. Publisher: Vij Books Price: 1,550

The Chinese invasion of Tibet, which culminated in the 1962 war between India and China, has often been portrayed as the “Great Chinese Betrayal”—“a stab in the back”, as Jawaharlal Nehru would say with much pain and anguish. Claude Arpi, in his 2017 book, Tibet: The Last Months of a Free Nation, proved with fresh shreds of evidence that the notion of “betrayal” was a farce. It was “a stab from the front”, as M. J. Akbar observed in his eloquent biography on Nehru. For, the then Prime Minister and his comrades refused to see the writing on the wall for more than a decade.

In his latest book, Will Tibet Ever Find Her Soul Again?, Arpi comes up with another explosive revelation: that Nehru’s India supplied rice for the invading PLA troops in Tibet when they were busy rampaging and decimating the Tibetan way of life and culture in the early 1950s. “The most grotesque incident of this period was the feeding of the PLA’s troops with rice coming through India,” writes the Franceborn expert on Tibet and China who is now settled in India. “Without Delhi’s active support, the Chinese troops would not have been able to survive in Tibet.”

Tibet, before the massive Chinese influx of the 1950s, was a self-sufficient society. The locals had, for centuries, practised sustainable development, and starvation was unheard of. But the PLA avalanche triggered a breakdown in the Tibetan economy.

The presence of thousands of policemen deployed by the authorities to prevent any untoward incidents in and around the shrine also has dissuaded many from their annual pilgrimage. In this one week, young women had not ventured out to the shrine.