Travancore Devasom Board (TDB) chairman Padmakumar has informed that the holy Sabarimala Aiyappan Temple would henceforth be known with its old name i.e. ‘Sri Dharma Sastha Temple’.

For many years, the abode of Lord Aiyappa was known as ‘Sri Dharma Sastha Temple’ but the same was changed during the Congress’ tenure in Kerala when the then TDB changed the famed temple’s name as ‘Sabarimala Sri Aiyappa Swamy Temple’.

The then TDB chairman Priar Gopalakrishnan had once said that young women can visit all the ‘Dharma Sastha Temples’ across the world but the abode of Lord Aiyappa is only at the Sabaramala Sri Aiyappa Swamy Temple. “As Lord Aiyappa is a ‘Brahmachari’ (unwed person), young women are not allowed to enter the sanctorum of the Sabarimala Temple,” he had reasoned.

The newly elected TDB, which met for the first time after the Communists ascended power in the State, has decided to change the name of the temple by going bak to the old name of ‘Sri Dharma Sastha Temple’ instead of the ‘Sabarimala Temple’. A formal decision was taken at the meeting of the Board yesterday.