KOCHI: The annual Chullikkavu Sree Durga Bhagavathy temple festival will start from Monday and continue till Friday. A special ‘Pongala Samarpanam’ has been organised on January 21 morning as part of the festival.
Held every year for five days in the Malayalam month of Makaram, the temple festival ends with a large ‘thalam’ procession on the fifth day on Avittom Nakshatram coinciding with the ‘prathishta’ of Sree Durga Devi in 1983. The installation of ‘chuttuvilakku’ (oil lamps) around the temple has been completed as part of the festival.
A committee has been appointed to look after the festival preparations. Said to be 500-year-old, the temple, according to residents, belonged to three Brahmin families. The temple came under the Nair community’s control after the Brahmin families ceased to exist.
The temple soon got dilapidated and was in desperate need for a revival. In 1942, K Subramanya Aiyar, an officer of Ogale Glass Factory functioning near the temple, decided to reconstruct the temple. P N Menon, retired general manager of FACT, showed interest in reconstructing the temple, which was renovated in 1983. It was later registered with the Kerala Kshethra Samrakshana Samithy.