President Droupadi Murmu offers prayers at Sabarimala Lord Ayyappa temple

President Droupadi Murmu on Wednesday offered prayers at the Lord Ayyappa temple in SabarimalaPresident Murmu is the first woman head of state to visit the Lord Ayyappa shrine at Sabarimala here for offering prayers She is also the second president to visit the shrine as before her former President V V Giri had visited Sabarimala in the 1970s and had travelled to the shrine in a dollyThe President who reached Pamba in a special convoy at around 11 am washed her feet in the Pampa river and then offered prayers at the nearby temples including the Lord Ganapathy shrineThereafter the melshanthi of the Ganapathy temple Vishnu Namboothiri filled the sacred bundle or irumudikkettu of Murmu who was dressed in a black saree at the Kettunira MandapamBesides the President her ADC Saurabh S Nair PSO Vinay Mathur and soninlaw Ganesh Chandra Hombram also got their sacred bundles district officials said in a statementSubsequently they threw coconuts at a stone wall near the temple and holding their sacred bundles on their heads they boarded the special fourwheel drive vehicles which carried them to the Sannidhanam along the 45kmlong Swami Ayyappan Road and traditional trekking route to the Lord Ayyappa shrineAt Sannidhanam she climbed the 18 holy steps to reach the shrine where she was greeted by state Devaswom Minister V N Vasavan and Travancore Devaswom Board TDB president P S Prasanth The temple Tantri Kandararu Mahesh Mohanaru received her with a poorna kumbhaAt the shrine she performed darshan of Lord Ayyappa with the sacred bundle on her head Then the President and her team placed their sacred bundles on the steps of the shrine and the melshanti head priest of the temple took their irumudikkettu for poojaAfter completing her darshan at the adjacent temples including Malikappuram the President returned to the TDB guesthouse for lunch and rest There were restrictions on darshan by devotees during the Presidents visit according to TDB officialsMurmu arrived at Pamba by road from the Rajiv Gandhi Indoor Stadium at Pramadam where she arrived by helicopter at 840 am She was greeted at Pramadam by Vasavan Pathanamthitta MP Anto Antony and othersThe Presidents convoy departed from the Raj Bhavan in Thiruvananthapuram for the airport at 725 amAfter the Sabarimala darshan she will return to Thiruvananthapuram in the evening On Thursday she will unveil a bust of former President K R Narayanan at the Raj BhavanLater she will inaugurate the Mahasamadhi Centenary celebrations of Sree Narayana Guru at the Sivagiri Mutt in Varkala and attend the valedictory function of the Platinum Jubilee celebrations of St Thomas College in Pala Kottayam districtPresident Murmu will conclude her Kerala visit on October 24 by attending the centenary celebrations of St Teresas College in Ernakulam Murmu arrived in Thiruvananthapuram on Tuesday evening for a fourday official visit to KeralaShe was welcomed at the international airport in the state capital by Kerala Governor Rajendra Vishwanath Arlekar Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan other public representatives and senior officialsThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever