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Sabarimala standoff: Women inches away from 18 holy steps, priests stop rituals to join protests

Sabarimala standoff: Women inches away from 18 holy steps, priests stop prayers to join protests 

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The tense standoff between the women and the protesters at Sabarimala shrine of Lord Ayappa continues. According to the latest reports, the women are just inches away from the 18 holy steps at the temple. 

For the first time ever, the rituals at the Lord Ayappa temple were affected as the priests came down and joined the protesters. Over 100 policemen are escorting the women to the temple. Frantic negotiations are on between Kerala IG and the protesters. Kerala Inspector General R Sreejith told the protesters that, ‘even he is a believer of Sabarimala.’ He also said that he had come to the temple ‘as a servant of law’. ‘We are doing our job and we won’t attack the devotees. We have to obey the law,’ the IG reportedly said. 

The protesters right outside the sanctum sanctorum are chanting Lord Ayappas name. The male devotees are protesting against the women’s entry into the temple. Journalist Kavitha Jakkal of Hyderabad-based Mojo TV and woman activist Rehana Fatima are just 10 minutes away from the holy steps. 

Their attempt to reach the shrine came a day after a New Delhi-based woman reporter of a foreign media outlet made a failed bid to visit the temple.

There have been strong protests by devotees opposing the entry of girls and women of menstrual age into the Lord Ayyappa temple.

The woman reporter is in her late 20s while the details of the second woman, who was carrying Irumudikkettu (holy bundle), was not immediately known.

If they climbed the hills, they would be the first women from the menstruating age group to visit the Sabarimala temple of Lord Ayyappa after the Supreme Court order permitting women of all age groups to enter the shrine.

On Thursday, the New Delhi-based woman journalist was stopped midway by devotees opposing the entry of women of menstrual age into the hill shrine.

The journalist accompanied by her male colleague, a foreigner, descended the hills from Marakkoottam area in the face of mounting protests.

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