It is that time of the year when thousands of women from India and abroad congregate for the annual festival of the Attukal Bhagavathy Temple in Thiruvananthapuram.
Today (on February 25), the heart of the city turns into a giant kitchen where women worship the Mother Goddess by cooking Pongala (rice cooked with jaggery and ghee, and garnished with cashewnuts and raisins) and other rice-based dishes such as Therali appam, Mandaputtu (Rice cakes steamed in leaves of cinnamon malabatrum and steamed balls of rice powder, green gram, coconut and jaggery flavoured with cardamom ) etc on open hearths. The ritual entered the Guinness Book of World Records for being the largest religious gathering of women on a single day.
