By Aditya Aamir
Pinarayi Vijayan is going for
broke. It’s a gamble. He has laid all his and the LDF’s eggs in the Swami
Ayyappan busting basket, hoping they’ll hatch Navothana chicks and a sweep of
Lok Sabha seats in GE 2019. And, not that he believes in god, he’s praying that
the Supreme Court will January 22 deliver 49 review petitions on the Sabarimala
verdict stillborn. The Kerala chief minister is on a vendetta to decimate Swami
Ayyappa.
Logic and rationale are not
for the Ayyappa faithful. They run on a bouquet of customs and rituals. A deep
faith in the divine power of the celibate deity. Pinarayi puts his faith in a
different set of gods –Karl Marx and Chairman Mao. His Holy books are the
Communist Manifesto and the three-volume Das Kapital, both of which rival the
Bible in print numbers. The philosophy they campaign is dead most wherever they
rang. But apply both to Sabarimala Ayyappa and they are killer-books.
In the chaos of India’s
electoral democracy, Marx made the Communist Party Marxist a force to reckon
with and Pinarayi was born. If Swami Ayyappa is woven-myth, Pinarayi is
carved-stone. Swami Ayyappa in his time was no-nonsense. Pinarayi is
no-nonsense. Where Ayyappa brought people of different inclines together,
Pinarayi is inclined to divide. Swami Ayyappa commands loyalty, Pinarayi makes
treachery a virtue.
It’s battle royal on the banks
of the Pamba. In courts of blind justice. Citing ‘constitutional morality’ ad
infinitum, Pinarayi is inserting menstrual age women in the equation.
Preferably politically-cashable Dalits to take judicial advantage of. Pinarayi
is police-escorting ‘yuvatis’ to Swami Ayyappa’s presence as if Swami
Ayyappan’s celibacy is curse! Pinarayi’s Navothana sits on a women’s wall. And
none of the ‘yuvati’ charged with #MeToo for violating Swami Ayyappa’s
brahmacharya.
GE 2019 is do-or-die for
Pinarayi and the Left. Win and Pinarayi will be Navothana hero, and the Left a
valued part of an MGB government at the Centre. If the top court rules for
review of the Sabarimala verdict, it will be kaput! Pinarayi will sink and the
Left will drown. But Pinarayi Vijayan plays for keeps. He doesn’t like to lose.
There is no mercy in him. He doesn’t take Prisoners of War.
The other day he asked a fiery
female Hindutva icon why’s she still alive? “Did you not say you’ll commit
suicide if entry of restricted women happens in Sabarimala? Well, it has
happened, not one but three women have entered, shouldn’t you be dead?” he
asked. And believing that CJI Ranjan Gogoi will not dent ex-CJI Dipak Misra’s
liberal halo, Pinarayi has initiated a move to restructure Sabarimala temple
administration. Beginning with a beheading!
Ayyappa Temple Chief Tantri Kandararu
Rajeevraru is in Pinarayi’s crosshair. The idea is to discredit the Tazhaman
Tantri family and weaken its stranglehold on Sabarimala Ayyappan temple. By
extension that of the ‘Pandalam royals’. One stone, two birds! Rajeevraru
stands accused of practicing “untouchability.” He ordered ‘cleaning’ of the
temple after Kanaka Durga and Bindu Ammini “desecrated” Ayyappa’s abode with
their presence.
Some say “untouchability” is
at the core of objection to women’s entry into Sabarimala. Untouchability is a
crime and punishable under the SC/ST (Atrocities) Act. Pinarayi’s ministers are
calling for the Chief Tantri’s head. One of them labelled him woman-hating
‘Brahman Rakshasa’. The Travancore Devaswom Board issued show cause why action
shouldn’t be taken.
Of course, mantri and board
are ignorant folks. The chief tantri cannot be evicted. Nowhere in the Supreme
Court order of September 28, 2018 does the top court say that the tantri is
barred from protecting temple customs and rituals. Besides, the Devaswom Board
itself is on record that the last word on all matters temple customs and
rituals is that of the Chief Tantri. The board said this in an affidavit
submitted to the Kerala High Court in 1991. The SC forgot to take note of this
in 2018.
What if the Chief Tantri turns
and charges the board with practicing untouchability against a Brahmin? Point
is if Pinarayi wants to be the Navothana hero, he should work towards
eliminating the caste system, which earlier avatars of Navothana could not. It
is a wonder why gender-warriors tolerate caste. A substitution of a Brahmin
tantri with a SC/ST tantri will not change ground realities.
Holding Sabarimala Ayyappa
guilty of fostering gender inequality and caste divisions is gross injustice.
The Sabarimala Ayyappa temple is where communal, caste and gender divisions get
blurred. The crush of human bodies at the Sabarimala shrine is proof in sweat
and salt. Of course, women of a certain age group will have to wait, unless
they turn male when climbing the hill, a miracle not even Swami Ayyappa can
accomplish. Some things are beyond gods, too.(IPA Service)
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