TDB to make financial transactions at Sabarimala digital

A special board meeting of the Travancore Devaswom Board held at the board headquarters here on Friday decided to make all financial transactions in Sabarimala completely digital to ensure transparency. Booking of rooms, offerings and donations will be made digital, said TDB president K. Jayakumar at a press conference after the board meeting. He said that the Ayyappa Sangamam will not be organised again as “Ayyappa does not need publicity”.

More rooms will also be available to pilgrims for online booking. Currently, only 190 out of a total of 690 rooms are available for pilgrims. Henceforth, 550 rooms will be available for booking. The collection of deposits for room booking will be stopped as there have been complaints in the past about delay in returning the deposit, said Mr. Jayakumar. Only the room rent will need to be paid in advance, in addition to which a non-refundable service charge of ₹50 per room will be charged.

Control room

Housekeeping work in the guesthouses in Sabarimala will be outsourced. Expressions of interest will be invited for this. A new guesthouse with 60 rooms will be constructed near the Sabari guesthouse, subject to the permission of the High Court and the Sabarimala High Power Committee. Its construction will be entrusted to government-accredited agencies. A round-the-clock festival control room will function at the TDB headquarters in connection with the Sabarimala pilgrimage from November 1 to January 30.

A detailed proposal submitted by the Police department regarding an AI-enabled crowd management system has been accepted in principle. The total cost of the project is ₹17 crore. Efforts will be made to raise the amount for the project by mobilising corporate social responsibility (CSR) funds. A technical quality audit team, consisting of a retired Chief Engineer and two retired Superintending Engineers (Civil and Electrical), will be appointed to ensure the quality of the construction work in Sabarimala.  

Sanitation protocol

A systematic sanitation protocol will be implemented. An in-principle agreement has been reached with the Clean Kerala Company for the disposal of waste in Sabarimala and Pampa. Products for all offerings in Sabarimala will be distributed only through the central store. The number of receipts for ‘padi puja’ distributed in a day will be increased from 1 to 5. This decision was taken after seeking the opinion of the Tantri. An amount of ₹1 lakh each will be distributed to the dependents of 54 people who died of heart attack while climbing the Sannidhaam last year. The amount will be distributed from the Pilgrim Relief Fund. The board meeting also decided to pay the bill for the renovation works in Sabarimala within a month of completing the work.