Unruly scenes at Srirangam temple leave four injured
The incident unfortunately resulted in an exchange of blows, which saw one devotee and three temple staff sustaining injuries. Separate complaints were lodged with Srirangam police by both the groups respectively.
Andhra Pradesh pilgrims coming out of Srirangam temple on Tuesday
TIRUCHY: An altercation between a group of devotees from Andhra Pradesh who were returning from Sabarimala and the Srirangam Arulmigu Ranganathaswamy temple security personnel for maintaining the serenity in the temple premises turned ugly on Tuesday.
The incident unfortunately resulted in an exchange of blows, which saw one devotee and three temple staff sustaining injuries. Separate complaints were lodged with Srirangam police by both the groups respectively.
According to sources, as the Vaikunta Ekadesi festival at Arulmigu Ranganathaswamy temple in Srirangam was scheduled to commence on Tuesday night with the Thirunedunthandakam event, the temple authorities have announced that there was no Moolasthana Sevai after 4.30 pm.
Injured devotee
It was also said that there would be a special pooja from 7.15 am to 9 am and the devotees would be allowed only till 7 am. This resulted in a surge of devotees in the morning hours.
Against such a backdrop, at around 6.45 am, a group of 34 devotees from Vijayawada in Andhra Pradesh who were returning from Sabarimala came to Srirangam temple for a habitual visit.
When they crossed the Santhanu Mandapam and reached the Gayathri Mandapam, the Andhra devotees raised slogans of ‘Govinda Govinda’ in high decibels and banged the temple dump box which upset the other devotees.
Since it is a tradition to maintain silence in the Gayathri Mandapam, the temple security staff — Vignesh, Bharath, and Selva approached the devotees from Andhra and asked them to maintain silence and this erupted into a quarrel and body blows.
As the devotees became more vociferous, one of the security staff hit the devotees Ram and Chenna Rao, resulting in one of them bleeding from the nose.
On information, the ACP (Srirangam) Niveda Lakshmi rushed to the spot and held talks with both groups before the separate complaints were lodged. Meanwhile, the IG (Central Zone) G Karthikeyan and City Commissioner of Police N Kamini rushed to the spot and conducted an inquiry.
BJP and Hindu outfits stage sit-in protest
Condemning the attack on the Andhra Pradesh devotees, the members of BJP, Hindu Munnani, and VHP staged a protest in front of the Ranga Ranga Gopuram in Sri Ranganathaswamy temple, Srirangam on Tuesday evening.
The Hindu Munnani Zonal Secretary Bojarajan, said, even if the devotees violated the norms, the temple staff should have smoothly handled them.
He also said that HR&CE was responsible for this. The protesters demanded HR&CE department shun control of the temples across the State. The Srirangam police arrested all 75 protesting members including five women.
