SABARIMALA: Lord Ayyappa temple here will be opened on Tuesday for the 10-day annual festival beginning on March 9. Melsanthi Parameswaran Nampoothiri will open the sreekovil at 5.30 pm in the presence of thantri Mahesh Mohanaru.
No rituals will be performed at the sreekovil in the evening. Kodiyettu ceremony, marking the beginning of the annual festival, will be performed between 10:30 and 11:30am. The thantri will perform the ceremony in the presence of the melsanthi.
Travancore Devaswom Board president K Anandagopan and member Manoj Charalel will be present at the ceremony. The ceremony, marking one of the concluding rituals of the annual festival, will be performed at Arattukadavu at Pampa, on the side of the Pampa river, at 11:30 am on March 18.
For this, a procession carrying the Sreebali idol of Lord Ayyappa will be taken out from Sannidhanam at 9am. After reaching Pampa at 11am, the arattu ceremony will be performed by the thantri at 11.30am.
On conclusion of the ceremony, the Sreebali idol will be kept in front of the Pampa Lord Ganapathi temple for darshan and offering 'para' by the devotees. At 3.30pm, the arattu procession will leave Pampa for Sannidhanam.
Utsavabali from March 10
Utsavabali, the important ritual as part of the festival, will be performed from the second day of the festival on March 10 to March 17.