A handful of brave young women could not afford to bear with this public insult and hence decided to enter the temple. On the roads to the temple, women were stopped and they were forced to disclose their age and were asked to show their identity cards. The Hindu Right vandalised vehicles and attacked women in the name of protecting the ‘celibate god’ Lord Ayyappa from ‘women who are impure by menstruation’.

Hence I decided to go to uphold the dignity of women,” said Bindu to Outlook.įollowed by the landmark judgment by the Supreme Court in September 2018 that lifted the ban on women in menstruating age entering Sabarimala temple, Kerala witnessed sporadic incidents of violence unleashed by the Hindu Right. While watching the street violence against women on the way to Pampa, I felt insulted, humiliated, and injured as a woman. “The Sangh Parivar only made me to take the decision to go. Though they were quite strangers before their entry to Sabarimala, the compelling reason for both of them to take a life-changing decision to enter the temple was all the same - to uphold the dignity of women. Both of them met on their way and decided to go together on December 24, 2018. The people of Kerala woke up to the new year in 2019 with the ‘shocking news’ of two women -Bindu and Durga- successfully entering Sabarimala in the wee hours on the New Year’s Eve despite violent resistance by the Sangh Parivar groups.īindu and Durga were not known to each other before their journey to Sabarimala. She is one of the two women who made history by trekking to the top of the Sabarimala - until then a men’s world of devotion.īindu and Kanaka Durga are the first two women who entered the temple followed by the Supreme Court verdict lifting the ban on women in menstruating age from visiting the temple in September 2018. According to her will wishers, she is not only teaching it but preaching and practising it as well. Bindu Ammini is a guest lecturer at Government Law College in Kerala’s Kozhikkode.

Brave uphold