With a few days left for the crucial assembly elections in Kerala (polling on April 6), the ruling Communist Party of India (Marxist) is busy with a house-to-house contact programme throughout the state to inform believers of the “real situation in Sabarimala” even as people living around the revered shrine are disillusioned with the politics over the issue. The contentious issue has returned to haunt the ruling party after its opponents invariably flaunted the temple card to woo believers. Having learnt a bitter lesson in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, in which it lost all but one of 20 Lok Sabha seats, the ruling party is worried — unrest in Sabarimala was cited as the main reason for its defeat in the last general elections. The hill temple and surrounding areas had witnessed unrest in 2018 after the state government tried to implement the Supreme Court verdict that removed restrictions on visits of child-bearing women saying it was against gender equality. The state had witnessed five shutdowns and two people died in the violence that rocked the state. Chittar is a hilly village located in Pathanamthitta district; at least 22 km away from the Sabarimala temple base camp Pambha, where the unrest against the verdict first began in 2018. Locals say it was a spontaneous movement sans any political colour or flag and they agree even Communists participated in the voluntary movement. Many political parties including the Congress and BJP initially welcomed the verdict. Then Congress president Rahul Gandhi and senior leaders of BJP including O Rajagopal termed the verdict “historic”. But as the situation slowly changed after spontaneous protests broke out throughout the state, the political parties were forced to change their stand.    

Source: HT