KOCHI: A year after the tumultuous pilgrimage season which turned the hill shrine of Lord Ayyappa into a battlefield, the Travancore Devaswom Board (TDB) seems to have accepted the ground reality. The TDB, which supported the entry of young women to the temple last year, now wants peace to prevail at Sabarimala so that devotees from other states can visit the temple without fear of protest and police action during the season.
On a day the Supreme Court pronounced its verdict on the vexed issue of entry of young women to Sabarimala, the government and the TDB reacted cautiously to avoid provocation. The TDB, which manages 1,250 temples, had suffered a loss of Rs 98.5 crore during the 67-day pilgrimage season last year as the temple witnessed a steady decline in footfall due to raging protests. Besides, the ‘kanikka challenge’, a campaign launched by Sabarimala Karma Samithi, its call to the devotees to stop donate to TDB temples also led to a steep decline in the board’s revenue.
With the protests draining its coffers, the TDB was forced to dig deep into its pocket, and pledge its fixed deposit to avail of a Rs 30-crore bank loan to disburse salary. With the pilgrim season set to begin on Sunday, the picture doesn’t look rosy for the board. Despite repeated attempts, as many as 82 of the 213 shops at Sannidhanam, Pampa and Nilakkal are yet to be auctioned. The traders are reluctant to take the shops on contract despite the board offering a 30 per cent cut in the auction money.
The auctioning of the shops at Sabarimala had fetched the board Rs 35 crore in 2017-18. However the board got only 50 per cent of the auction amount in 2018-19 as the traders refused to pay the second instalment citing losses due to drop in the number of pilgrims.
Former president of TDB A Padmakumar and former member KP Shankardas, who stepped down on Wednesday, told TNIE that the board and the government should strive to ensure peace at Sabarimala so that more pilgrims can visit the hill shrine.
“The lion’s share of the TDB’s income comes from pilgrims from other states. Most of the other-state pilgrims dropped their pilgrimage plans last year due to protests at Sabarimala, which led to a financial crisis. So we should ensure peace at Sabarimala,” said K P Shankardas.
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