Board says court can’t disturb ancient practice

The Travancore Devaswom Board asserted that the practice of preventing women to enter Sabarimala temple existed since antiquity and that the Supreme Court should not disturb it.

The counsel appearing for the Board made this submission before the five judge Constitution Bench hearing the batch of writ petitions challenging the ban on entry of women between 10 and 50 years of age into the temple.He argued that the court could not decide what is an essential religious practice However the Court said that it could not accept a practice that was patriarchal and chauvinistic.