Sabarimala Runs Low on Aravana as Monthly Puja Nears Close
Sabarimala faces an acute Aravana shortage with just over 5,000 tins left as the monthly puja window closes, prompting the TDB to limit sales to one tin per devotee.
The Ayyappa temple at Sabarimala is grappling with an acute shortage of Aravana, with only a little over 5,000 tins of the offering left in stock as the ongoing monthly pilgrimage window draws to a close.
Around 17,000 devotees are expected at the hill shrine before it shuts at 10 pm on Monday. While 15,000 pilgrims have booked darshan online, spot bookings are likely to push the total footfall past that figure.
With the shortage deepening, the Travancore Devaswom Board (TDB) has restricted Aravana sales to a single tin per devotee, a move that has sparked protests among pilgrims over the past two days. On Sunday, devotees were given only three packets of Appam and one tin of Aravana each. Queues stretched for hours as pilgrims waited to secure a single tin, and police had to step in at times to calm agitated crowds.
The crisis traces back to the Aravana production plant at Sannidhanam being shut for maintenance just before the shrine opened for the five-day monthly puja on September 16. Adequate stocks were not built up before the work began, which worsened the shortfall.
The TDB also attributed the situation to a sharp rise in pilgrim footfall, particularly from other states, during the monthly puja. An official said the board had rushed into renovating the plant because it could not afford another shortage during the annual pilgrimage season, but had not anticipated such a large turnout and had planned its buffer stock on the basis of previous years' trends.
During the last pilgrimage season, the board had to cap Aravana sales at 10 tins per devotee after demand outstripped the plant's production capacity.
The current shortage comes just weeks before the annual Mandalam Makaravilakku pilgrimage season, scheduled to begin on November 16. Preparations are under way to raise the plant's daily production capacity by around one lakh tins, which officials expect will take it to roughly 3.25 lakh tins a day. The plant presently has 26 preparation pans, six cooling chambers and six boilers, with a daily capacity of 2 lakh to 2.25 lakh tins.
The renovation is expected to take about 40 days, with production likely to resume by the second week of October. The board aims to build a buffer stock of more than 50 lakh tins before the annual pilgrimage season gets under way.