Cleanse Kerala’s temples of politics
Editorial, The New Indian Express
December 21, 2007
http://www.newindpress.com/NewsItems.asp?ID=IEJ20071220220124&Title=Second+Editorial&rLink=0

The Justice Paripoornan Commission report on all that is wrong at Sabarimala, Kerala’s famed hill shrine, can indeed make a difference if even 50 per cent of its 79 recommendations are imbibed in letter and spirit. But we prefer to stay on a realistic plane, at least until the first 10 suggestions are adopted and implemented; the rest can follow soon after. The foremost recommendation is the de-politicisation of the Travancore Devaswom Board (TDB), the governing body of more than 1200 temples in central and south Kerala. The TDB comes a close second in terms of being an entity in which positions are sought after. The various State-run PSUs, of course, lead the way. But the TDB is most coveted by political cronies who sport a tinge of spirituality on their sleeves. The functioning of this Board has always left much to be desired, and in the process has consistently raised more questions than answers. This much has been established by the findings of various inquiry commissions; and there have been as many as ten of them since 1950, almost one every decade. Yet, nothing seems to have changed. Surely, in the process of the various inquiries, the entire gamut of TDB operations, every aspect of it has been studied and scrutinised. Yet, most of the reports lie swathed in cobwebs while the plight of pilgrims continues unrelieved.

This edition of the Sabarimala pilgrimage best underlines the irrelevancy and meaninglessness of having an authority like the TDB. A non-VIP pilgrim has to stand in a queue for more than five hours to get a five-second darshan of Lord Ayyappa. The distribution of prasadam has gone haywire. And worse, the TDB has no solution. But the Justice Paripoornan Commission has listed 79 steps for the salvation of pilgrims. The Kerala Government must not waste a single minute in adopting the recommendations of the panel whose members — Justice B.M.Thulasidas and former CBI director D.R. Karthikeyan being the others — are of impeccable repute in the country.

It should be ensured that this report does not meet the same fate as previous ones, and that the cleansing ritual must be extended to all temples under the TDB as the evidence of political interference are quite visibly writ on their walls too. Co-operating with any exercise to purify the premises of all TDB temples where politics echoes louder than Vedic chants will be prove to be a valuable exercise.