There is heavy rush of pilgrims at Sabarimala in the run up to the Mandalapuja, stretching the pilgrim management protocol in the holy hillock to its limit.
As on Tuesday morning, the queue for darshan at the Sannidhanam extended up to Sabaripeedom. In a bid to manage the rush, pilgrims are now permitted to trek the hill only in batches.
Though the authorities have fixed the daily limit of virtual queue bookings to 80,000, over a lakh devotees each have trekked up the hill in the past three days, says P.S. Prasanth, president, Travancore Devaswom Board. Given the current trend, the overall turnout for the season is expected to cross 50 lakh for the whole season.
