KOCHI: The Kerala High Court on Friday directed the Travancore Devaswom Board (TDB) to inform whether spot booking facilities for Sabarimala darshan can be set up in Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh. It also asked the board to check whether the spot booking facility can be extended to other temples managed by TDB.A division bench comprising Justice Anil K Narendran and Justice P G Ajith Kumar issued the order while considering the petitions pertaining to the virtual queue system implemented by the Kerala Police with the assistance of Tata Consultancy Services (TCS).
The TDB submitted that spot booking facility is now available at Nilakkal, Erumeli and Kumily. While infrastructure for spot booking has been provided at Pathanamthitta, Kottarakkara, Pandalam, Vaikom, Ettumanoor, Perumbavoor and Keezhillam, the authorities are awaiting username and password from TCS. Currently, spot booking is permitted for Sabarimala darshan either on the date of booking or on the next day.The court stated that while insisting spot booking, its intention is to ensure that devotees who do not have the required facilities for online booking, are given opportunity to have darshan at Sabarimala temple.
In such circumstances, spot booking cannot be confined to darshan on the date of booking or the next day, at places other than Nilakkal. In all other centres, spot booking should be permitted is slots are available during Mandalam-Makaravilakku festival season, held the High Court.The Special Commissioner informed the court that there were 6,489 bookings via virtual queue system for darshan on November 16, while it was 14,245 and 10,651 for November 17 and 18, respectively. However, 4,986 of the devotees had darshan on November 16, 9,409 devotees on November 17 and 7,502 on November 18.