Kochi: The holy hillshrine at Sabarimala is witnessing increasing pilgrim flow year after year necessitating enhancement of infrastructure facilities. However, the very fact that Lord Ayyappa temple is located in the buffer zone of Periyar Wildlife Sanctuary results in the clash of future development projects with the guidelines issued under the Wildlife (Protection) Act which bans tourism and other activities in core areas of tiger reserve forests.
Now, the Travancore Devaswom Board is all set to push for delinking Sabarimala Lord Ayyappa temple from the purview of Periyar Tiger Reserve for implementing various schemes, which would also “solve” the differences that have cropped among the Devaswom and Forest departments when it comes to key projects like Kunnar dam.
A delegation led by Chief Minister Oommen Chandy will meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi on December 10 with a plea to declare the Sabarimala temple as a national pilgrim centre.
“Only if we get additional forest land could we set up sufficient infrastructure facilities to the pilgrims. An estimated 60 million pilgrims visit the hill shrine every year. The current areas allocated to the TDB have been utilised to the fullest. We are seeking to delink Sabarimala from the PTR so that infrastructure facilities could be upgraded, a must for declaring it as a national pilgrim centre,” said Mr V.S. Jayakumar, secretary, Travancore Devaswom Board.
However, the state forest department is against allocating more areas on the ground of “conservation of wildlife and ecological protection”.
“The demand for additional land was never-ending and unreasonable as we have already allocated a total of 78 hectares of land to the TDB (68 hectares at Sannidhanam and 12 at Pampa). However, we can say that no projects included in the master plan would be delayed for want of forest department nod. They have already carried out projects worth Rs 66 crore since last season,” said Mr C. Babu, Deputy Director, Periyar (West).
The “waste” left behind at the conclusion of the two-month pilgrimage season is threatening the flora and fauna. Various programmes like ‘Punyam Ponkavanam’ should be made more effective.
“The way forward should be a strategy for sustainable and eco-friendly development of pilgrimage facilities, which can solve the problems of both the humans and the nature,” the officer said.
The forest department though is open for talks and wants co-ordinated efforts with the TDB, said Mr Mohanan Pillai, Deputy Director, Periyar (East).
Sabarimala and its sacred forest were included in the Periyar sanctuary back in 1978, ignoring the views of the board which is the principal agency responsible for providing basic amenities to the pilgrims.
Currently, both the departments are at loggerheads regarding the use of forest areas to increase the height of the Kunnar dam to provide sufficient water for Sabarimala pilgrims.
The matter is before the High Court and the TDB submitted before the court that it was necessary to increase the height of the dam by 2.5 metres for meeting the additional water requirement of 2 mld.
Around 9.5 mld of water was needed at the Sannidhanam and along the trekking route from Pampa to the Sannidhanam. While 6.5 mld of water could be sourced from the Pampa, only one mld could be currently used from Kunnar dam, it said.
Meanwhile, the demand to delink Sabarimala from the Periyar Tiger Reserve was backed by more organizations like the Akhila Bharatha Ayyappa Seva Sanghom and the Hindu Aikya Vedi.
“The entire area should be delinked from the PTR and made a reserve forest. It should be brought under the control of the Ranni DFO. The TDB should also undertake only those projects which are ecologically sustainable,” said Kummanam Rajashekaran, general secretary.
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