Two devotees and three guards are learnt to have sustained injuries after a scuffle broke out between a group of visitors and guards at the Sri Ranganatha Swamy temple in Srirangam in Tamil Nadu’s Tiruchirappalli district on Tuesday morning. According to officials, the incident took place around 7.15 am, when about 34 devotees from Rajahmundri in Andhra Pradesh, returning after visiting the Sabarimala Ayyappa temple in Kerala, visited the Srirangam temple. “Since it was closing time, there was heavy rush and the crowd was moving at a slow pace. The temple guards on duty were overseeing this. A group of devotees from Andhra Pradesh had started banging the hundial causing hindrance to other devotees. Despite the temple guards asking them to stop, the group did not relent and started shouting at them. When two of the guards told them to stop, they were attacked. One of the guards was pushed against the hundial, and this led to an altercation and the guards tried to bring the situation under control,” a police office told indianexpress.com. “They demanded an apology from the temple guard for hitting one of them. Despite their offering an apology, even after some of their personnel sustained injury, the devotees were not satisfied. They wanted the temple guard to touch their feet and apologise. After the temple guard declined to do so, the devotee sat near the sanctum and raised slogans like ‘police down down’,” the officer added. No police complaint has been registered by either side following the incident. Meanwhile, BJP state chief K Annamalai posted online a video of the incident and hit out at the DMK government. “The Iyyappa devotees who have had 42 days of Vrath, with all devotion, wanted to pray to Ranganatha Swamy after their return from Sabarimala. The Iyyappa devotees questioned the long wait in the queue and special treatment to a select few who were assaulted near the sanctum sanctorum & which resulted in bloodshed inside the Temple premises,” he wrote on X, formerly Twitter. Annamalai further said that “this arrogance of the HR and CE department” was one of the reasons why the BJP wanted it to be kept out of temple affairs. He said the party would protest demanding stringent action against the officials “who had spoiled the sanctity of the temple”. Earlier, BJP workers protested in front of the temple after the incident.
