Guruvayur Sri Krishna Temple - "How pooja was stopped citing public inconvenience. Worship is for God... the Supreme Court

The Supreme Court on Wednesday (December 11, 2024) agreed to consider the petition filed against the High Court order in favour of the administration of Guruvayur Sri Krishna Temple in Kerala. The temple administration had decided to discontinue the ancient ritual of Udayasthaman puja performed on Ekadashi.A bench of Justices J K Maheshwari and Rajesh Bindal issued notice to the Guruvayur Devaswom Management Committee, the Kerala government and others on the plea against the December 7 order. The Supreme Court, however, said that the daily puja schedule displayed on the website of the temple administration should not be changed.The Supreme Court questioned, "How was the puja stopped citing inconvenience to the public. Worship is for God. Therefore, it cannot be stopped for the public to increase the divinity of the deity. The management should find other ways to control the crowd. We need to investigate why this is so.The court has also directed that there should be no change in the daily worship of the temple. The court said that the schedule of worship that is available on the website of the temple, the worship should be done in the same way. There is no change in the schedule and nothing should be removed from it. "We cannot interfere now," the bench said. We will issue notice to the other party. At first, we were satisfied.Udayasthaman Puja refers to the various pujas performed in the temple throughout the day from sunrise (Uday) to sunset (Asthaman). The temple administration had recently decided not to conduct the rituals on Ekadashi citing difficulties in crowd management and the desire of devotees to extend the darshan time.