NEW DELHI: The BJP on Thursday welcomed the Supreme Court's decision to refer the Sabarimala case to a seven-member bench.
BJP former president Kummanam Rajasekharan while welcoming the decision and urged the state government to show restraint "as the Supreme Court has not taken a final decision on the matter".
"The (state) government should not use the lack of clarity regarding stay in the case to facilitate the entry of women," he stressed.
BJP state general secretary M T Ramesh, meanwhile, warned the LDF government of serious consequences if it went "ahead with any moves to make the hill shrine a place for non-believers."
Welcoming the Supreme Court verdict, he said the state should stop the policy of supporting the entry of women taking note of the new developments in the case.
Senior BJP leader BL Santhosh tweeted, "Sabarimala issue referred to a larger bench. The welcome decision of the SC (is) in the direction of protecting rights of devotees and upholding faith. It was never a matter of fundamental rights. It was a matter of age-old tradition accepted by society."
The Supreme Court on Thursday said restrictions on women in religious places was not limited to Sabarimala alone and was prevalent in other religions while referring all review pleas to a larger bench.
Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi, reading the majority verdict on behalf of himself and Justices A M Khanwilkar and Indu Malhotra, said the larger bench will decide all such religious issues relating to Sabarimala, entry of women in mosques and practice of female genital mutilation in the Dawoodi Bohra community.
The Sabarimala temple reopens on November 17.