As preparations are underway for the Vaikunta Ekadasi on 23 December 2023, the Srirangam Ranganathaswamy Temple has been seeing a large influx of crowd and with the onset of Sabarimalai season, many Ayyappa devotees from across southern part of India have been flocking to the temple on their way.
A group of 30-35 Sabarimala pilgrims from neighbouring states of Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka who had come to the Srirangam temple were allegedly attacked by the staff of Tamil Nadu government’s Hindu Religious & Charitable Endowments (HR&CE) department after being unable to control the crowd influx.
According to report by Hindustan Times Tamil, an official was appointed by the temple management to control the burgeoning crowd. More than 30 Ayyappa devotees from neighbouring states who had been waiting for quite some time were scrambling to get the darshan of the lord and were chanting “Govinda Govinda” in devotion. The temple official there asked them not to shout “Govinda Govinda” and asked them to stay silent. As they tried to go ahead and have darshan of the deity chanting “Govinda Govinda”, it resulted in chaos.
An argument broke out between the guarding officials and the devotees which soon escalated into a scuffle. At that time, one man named attack on Chenna Rao was attacked where in his nose was broken and blood was dripping. In a viral video shared by temple activist Rangarajan Narasimhan, blood can be seen spilled all over near the moolasthanam with the injured man sitting in protest near the moolasthanam demandin action against officials.
The temple management who came then negotiated with Chennai Rao and a few other devotees from Andhra Pradesh and took them to the police station.
The devotees from the neighbouring states have filed complaints demanding the arrest of the temple guards who attacked them and the temple guards also filed a complaint demanding action against the devotees who attacked them.
As blood was spilled inside the temple near the moolasthanam, the temple was closed for reparation prayers (punyavachanam) and was opened after some time.
Condemning the incident, BJP Tamil Nadu President K. Annamalai lambasted the DMK government and the HR&CE department.
“The Iyyappa devotees questioned the long wait in the queue and special treatment to a select few who were assaulted near the sanctum sanctorum & which resulted in bloodshed inside the Temple premises. This arrogance of the HR&CE department is one of the many reasons why BJP Tamil Nadu has been wanting them out of Temple administration.“, Annamalai said.
He also announced that the Trichy unit of the BJP would protest against the HR&CE Department saying “BJP Tamil Nadu’s Trichy district unit will today hold a protest outside the Srirangam Ranganatha Swamy Temple against the TN HR&CE department, demanding the strictest action against those spoiling the sanctity of the Temple.“
A government which has no faith in Hindu Dharma has no business to be in Hindu Temples.
The Iyyappa devotees who have had 42 days of Vrath, with all devotion, wanted to pray to Ranganatha Swamy after their return from Sabarimala.
The Iyyappa devotees questioned the long wait… pic.twitter.com/4BbNii9La5
— K.Annamalai (@annamalai_k) December 12, 2023
Of late, the glorious Srirangam temple has been hitting the news for all the wrong reasons.
On 8 December 2023, a lorry, purportedly owned by the Trichy City Corporation, attempted to navigate through one of the gopurams on the western side of the temple and caused serious damage to the ancient wall reliefs.
But due to the width of the lorry, it was unable to enter and got stuck halfway. When the lorry was driven backwards, it scraped through the wall carving leaving it seriously damaged.
In August 2023, a segment of the eastern entry tower at Srirangam Sri Ranganathaswamy Temple collapsed.
Subscribe to our channels on Telegram, WhatsApp, and Instagram and get the best stories of the day delivered to you personally.