REVIEW OF WOMEN’S STUDIES Attukal Pongala: Youth Clubs, Neighbourhood Groups and Masculine Performance of Religiosity Darshana Sreedhar This article unravels the complex narratives which might hehe pongala11 at the Attukal Bhagavathy temple in Thiru- counter the popular perception of the pongalala festival as vananthapuram is renowned as a gathering which has made it eponymous with the title “Sabarimala of an “all-women space”. The all-male groupings that have T women”..22 Even though it is only one of the many rituals which sprung up in and around the Attukal Bhagavathy temple form a part of the temple’s annual festivities, pongala has during the festival and their participation in the ritual are almost single-handedly been instrumental in making the examined closely. An analysis of the film Vedivazhipadu, temple a bustling site of pilgrimage. Pongala falls on the karthika star of the Malayalam month of Makaram-Kumbham which is set against the backdrop of the festival, also (February-March), to be precise on the penultimate day of the incisively questions the taken-for-granted “purity” of the 10-day festivities. Pongala, the collective act of cooking by the ritual and its nature as a hyper-feminine space. women devotees as aa nercha (service or offering) to goddess Bhagavathy, is coloured strongly by its mass participation. Occupying the space of an “all-women ritual”, the participation of devotees on that day has run into such gargantuan numbers, increasing with every succeeding year, that it has been appro- priated as a hyper-feminine space and as a ritual performed exclusively by women devotees. This is evident in the accounts of the “congregation of women” and the participation of hundreds of thousands of women devotees cutting across caste, class, religion and other differences which is seen as being emblem- atic of communal harmony. The festival has made it twice to the Guinness World Records as the “largest annual gathering of women” – in 1997 with a participation of 1.5 million women devotees, and in 2009 with a gathering of 2.5 million women. This article unravels the complex narratives which might counter the popular perception of pongala as an “all-women space” through two sets of observations. In the first section, which forms a part of the ethnographic study carried out from January to March 2013 in Attukal, I look at the pourasamithiss (citizen forums), youth clubs and neighbourhood groups which have come up in and around the temple during the period and their participation in the ritual. I look at how these all-male groupings intervene and mediate discussions on the need for a participatory mode of governance. This section also examines how the Janamaithri Suraksha Project, launched by the Kerala state government as a community policing initiative to curb crimes and encourage community participation, finds its space in the organisation of the Attukal pongala. The second section of the paper looks at the Malayalam film Vedivazhipadu (directed by Shambhu Purushothaman, 2013) which mobi- lised the Attukal pongala as a backdrop for the narrative and the contestations following the release of the film. Vedivazhi- Darshana Sreedhar ([email protected]) is a PhD candidate padu was denied a certificate by the Central Board of Film at the Department of Cinema Studies, School of Arts and Aesthetics, Certification (CBFC) and an extreme right-wing organisation Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. demanded that it be banned. Economic & Political Weekly EPW APRIL 26, 2014 vol xlIX no 1717 5353 REVIEW OF WOMEN’S STUDIES The days leading up to the Attukal pongala are marked by authority from Aruvikkara reservoir had burst at four points. jubilation, with the locality transforming into a mela and the In no time, alternative mechanisms to supply water had to be festive atmosphere giving a different colour to Thiruvanan- arranged on a war footing as problems would have magnified thapuram city. With vendors setting up their stalls selling fancy had the water shortage forced people to rely on unsafe water.4 items, roadside sales of mud pots, sales of “pongala saris”, and More than being a ritual associated with a Hindu temple, even palmists and astrologers lined up to predict futures, a the Attukal pongala becomes an event which mobilises a vari- range of activities take place simultaneously, attracting quite a egated crowd. This includes devotees who have come from lot of customers. The narrow stretches leading to the temple faraway places to offer pongala, the people living in the locality are packed with women, and an entourage occupying the of Attukal who see it as an annual performance of “hospitality” roads with bag and baggage looks out for “convenient” places when they take care of the needs of the devotees, the vendors to offer pongala. Here, convenience need not always translate for whom it forms a part of their routine spatial relocation, and into offering pongala in proximity to the temple. As the stretch for those who are at Attukal on “pongala duty”, which itself of land acquired by the temple trust to facilitate the offering of they see as a form of nercha. Even when the pongala has been pongala is not sufficient to accommodate the devotees, the projected as a public ritual where devotees participate irrespec- preferable sites for the devotees can very well be pavements or tive of their religious beliefs and where class and social bound- bus stations or the railway station which give them easy pas- aries are toned down to the minimum, the neat narratives do sage back to their destinations once the offerings are sancti- cause discontent among sections inhabiting the locality of Attukal fied with the sacred water by the priests in the evening. What who are not able to share the fruits of the festivities, in spite of gives the pongala a democratic flavour is the manner in which the physical proximity they share with the temple. For instance, it spills out of the temple premises to the narrow lanes, govern- MSK Nagar colony, otherwise known as Sinkarathoppu, which is ment offices and a radius of approximately 14 kms around the only a few metres away from the temple, is a case in point. temple. The roads are dotted with varied symbolic markers The colony was formed in 1964 when the Scheduled Caste/ such as the huge banners of gymkhanas which are decorated Scheduled Tribe (SC /ST) Corporation bought the land which with the image of Hanuman, cut-outs of film stars promoting was leased out to Anandan Nambiar by the maharaja of Tra- their new releases, jewellery showrooms exhibiting their lat- vancore. Housing more than a thousand people and compris- est instalment schemes for prospective customers to buy gold ing over 250 families, the majority of the colony residents are for marriages, and even huge hoardings announcing the state dalits. Allegedly seen as an area which breeds drug government’s prominent achievements in the course of its ten- peddlers and goondas, this area is usually under the scanner ure. Thus, it is an array of fleeting and ephemeral experiences of the local police, as “an area where problems can erupt that can easily distract the gaze of a passer-by. at any minute”, as one of the police constables who is on a regular patrol told me.5 Even during the pongala festival, the Many Stakeholders colony is under strict vigil. Mukesh, a young man in his In the framing of the pongala, one can see the projection of mid-20s who is also an active member of Shiny Star Theatres, Attukal as a Sabarimala of women through the rhetoric of a local club of the colony, told me as he was introducing me to numbers. Here, an anonymous crowd of women become the some of the women in the colony who were busy with the uncountable “mass” and relative performance in numbers preparations for the next day: “When these women make use compared to the previous years is taken without any statistical of the colony space to perform pongala, it is a proactive step accuracy to tabulate the extent of participation. Since it is a towards claiming the dignified lives we aspire for. It is heart- scattered arrangement with spatial dispersion, the narrow ening to see them prefer our premises to offer pongala than alleys or courtyards of houses or even parking lots can be other places which are seen as better placed.”6 Their limited probable locations for the pongala. By virtue of being hosted in incomes do not prevent them from providing their guests the capital city of Kerala, its success is also a much anticipated with whatever they need for the pongala, which includes a moment for the ruling government. If successful, the govern- feast and arrangements for the brick kilns and music system ment’s response towards tackling the anonymous crowd is to welcome the devotees. But the colony residents were upset seen as a testimony to its efficiency in dealing with any exigency with the second-rate treatment meted out to them by the at hand. Seen with “electronic eyes” in the form of multiple Attukal temple trust. One of the office bearers of the residents’ cameras installed at various points by the satellite channels association said: reporting live from the temple premises, there is hardly any If the claims of [the] pongala as thinning down the class barriers were uncertainty. The Thiruvananthapuram Municipal Corporation, true, they should also take into consideration the voice of the people the nodal body invested with the responsibility of facilitating whose invisible presence is crucial for making [the] pongala a success. the pongala by arranging the public works, water, electricity There are contract jobs on offer for the span of the pongala.