Plgrims to Sabarimala continue to leave their clothes on the banks of Pamba

Many of the pilgrims who visit Sabarimala temple usually leave their clothes on the banks of the river Pamba in the belief that such an the act will absolve them of their sins. This practice has been banned by the High Court but, still, the devotees continue to leave their clothes on the river banks. The Travancore Devaswom Board (TDB) has, therefore, awarded the contract for collecting these clothes to a Tamil Nadu native for Rs 8 lakh.
This has been reported in timesofindia.indiatimes.com dated 22 December 2015.

Usually the board auctions the right to collect clothes in the river but, this time, they did not do that because of the high court order. Instead, they deployed a contractor this year too as pilgrims continue leaving their clothes in the river.
The TDB president has admitted that the awareness campaigns among pilgrims in this regard had not brought the desired results. The police personnel deployed in Sabarimala are busy controlling the rush of pilgrims and find it difficult to monitor the discarded clothes aspect. A suitable solution would have to worked out to overcome this difficulty.

(Image courtesy wikimediacommons.org)

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The heavy rains in the region has flooded the famous Tirumala temple of Lord Balaji and there is just a trickle of devotees. The temple remained out of bounds for thousands of pilgrims because of floods and landslides that had been triggered by continuous rains. The authorities were forced to keep an arterial road leading to the temple closed.
This has been reported in timesofindia.indiatimes.com dated 24 November 2015.

Usually it sees a heavy rush on weekends but, this weekend, the rush to one of the country's most famous hilltop shrine shrunk by half to just 50,000. There were at least 30,000 fewer pilgrims waiting for darshan the next day. It took just three hours for the general darshan to be completed those who travel by foot through the mountains got darshan within two hours because there were very few people en route.
Many devotees were compelled to cancel their trips because rains have been continuously pounding the temple town and the shrine above for the last 10 days, forcing people to stay indoors.

Image courtesy wikimediacommons.org)

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Two women in their 50s are reported to have been killed during a stampede in Puri on the occasion of the annual Rath Yatra. It was a massive turnout of nearly 10-lakh devotees this year in this annual chariot festival of Lord Jagannath along with his brother Balabhadra and sister Subhadra. The stampede left another 14 injured – most of them were women and children.
This has been reported in timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india dated 19 July 2015.

The stampede apparently occurred when the devotees were waiting to catch a glimpse of the new deities on their bedecked chariots at two places — Marichikot Chhak and Narendra Kona. The deaths took place at Marichikot Chhak around 5pm. Moreover, another over 20 were injured when Balabhadra's chariot reached Narendra Kona.
The festive mood was also marred by reports of some other deaths in different accidents. A man drowned in the sea, another was run over by a train and a man fell to his death from the roof of a building while watching the chariot pulling festival. Two others are reported to be missing in the sea – their bodies are yet to be recovered.
It seems around 500 pilgrims, mostly elders, fainted in the unbearable humidity and had to be treated at the temporary health camps. Shree Jagannath Temple Administration had announced insurance coverage of Rs 5 lakh for each unnatural death during the nine-day car festival in Puri. There were six pilgrims who had died in stampede in front of chariots in 2008.
Incidentally, due to the stampede, the schedule has been disturbed - only one chariot, that of of Balabhadra reached the destination Gudicha Temple on Saturday while the chariots of Subhadra and Jagannath could not. The temple authorities have indicated that the chariot pulling will resume on Sunday morning.
(Image courtesy wikimediacommons.org)

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