Sabrimala: Devotees congregated at Dharmasastha Temple of Sabrimala to offer monthly prayers to Lord Ayyappa for the Malayalam month of 'Kanni', informed the Devaswam board on Thursday.  The Devotees will be allowed to enter the shrine for monthly puja till September 21. The corona vaccine certificate is mandatory for the devotees visiting the temple. Also, all the guidelines related to Corona were being followed inside the premises. Only 15,000 people are allowed to enter temple premises in a day. Entry is allowed only through online registration.

Around seven months after it was closed in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, the doors of the Sabarimala temple were thrown open for devotees from October 16, 2020, albeit with certain restrictions.

 Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan had made it mandatory to carry a COVID-19 negative certificate within 48 hours of online registration. Earlier, on Thursday, Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan said that almost 68 percent of the total COVID-19 cases reported in India are from Kerala. Kerala has over 1.99 lakh active cases.

Earlier in May, the Travancore Devaswom Board, which manages the Lord Ayyappa temple on the Sabarimala hill in Kerala's Pathanamthitta district, imposed a ban on pilgrims entering the shrine in light of the looming second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic.

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