Sabarimala: Strategic preparation and meticulous planning. That sums up the police action facilitating the entry of two women in their early 40s – Bindu and Kanakadurga – into Sabarimala in the early hours of Wednesday.
It was said that a high-level police team, comprising State Police Chief Lokanath Behera, IG Balram Kumar Upadhyay, Superintendent of Police (Kottayam) Hari Sankar, Sannidhanam special officer Jayadev IPS, ASO Suresh and a team of personnel deployed at Pamba, were directly involved in the surprise pre-dawn operation.
Bindu, hailing from Malappuram, and Kanakadurga of Kozhikode, had made an earlier attempt on December 24 but were forced to abandon their plan after being chased away by right-wing protesters. The police took the women, weary of the long trek and commotion, first to the Government Medical College at Kottayam, and later shifted them to an unknown location in Kannur district.
Before being taken to Kannur, they had been kept under custody in three undisclosed destinations in Pathanamthitta and Kottayam districts. A team of police personnel from Kottayam were in charge of their security.
The original plan was to facilitate their darshan when the temple reopened for the Makaravilakku festival on December 30. However, the police were forced to postpone the trek to the next day in view of the heavy rush of devotees at the holly shrine.
Also, the government had concerns that if the women had entered the temple on December 31, it would have an adverse impact on the wall of women programme scheduled to be held on January 1. So, the cops were instructed to take Bindu and Kanakadurga to the temple on January 2.
Around 10.30 pm on January 1, the Pamba police received an anonymous call saying that two women, accompanied by six policemen, were proceeding to Pamba via Vadasserikkara. After some time, the women arrived at Pamba in a private vehicle escorted by police. They were taken to the Bailey bridge near the Sannidhanam on the Chandrananadan Road in a forest department ambulance, which had oxygen cylinders and saline drips inside it. The women allegedly travelled with IV drips attached to their hands as a cover-up.
They got down near Sannidhanam and walked towards the temple accompanied by six plain-clothes policemen. When the fellow cops and Devaswom guards deployed along the path queried about the women, the team escorting them told that they were IG’s guests.
Thereafter, the two were taken to the Sannidhanam through the staff gate along the underground passage adjacent to the aravana distribution counter. Even the officials attached to the bomb squad had been moved out of the Sannidhanam before the arrival of the women.
Special officer Jayadev took charge of the operation and helped the women sneak into the Balikalpura which houses the altar. The officers who were on duty in the area allowed the women to enter the sanctum santorum.
The two had a quick darshan, standing in the last row, at 3.48 am when the temple opened for ‘Nirmalyam’. When the women had the darshan, the Ganapathy Homam ritual was underway. So their presence escaped the notice of the priests and Devaswom officials.
Immediately after the darshan, the women were taken back in the same ambulance through a pre-designated route so that potential protesters wouldn’t recognise them.
