The Travancore Devaswom Board, which manages over 1,200 temples in Kerala, has decided to appoint priests from the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. One ST and 18 SC priests will soon be appointed on a part-time basis.

The board is an autonomous temple body that manages shrines across the state, including the Sabarimala Lord Ayyappa Temple.

“This is the first time that the temple body is appointing a Scheduled Tribe person as a priest in shrines under the TDB,” state Devaswom minister Kadakampally Surendran said in a Facebook post.

So far, 310 people have been selected for the post of part-time priests from the rank list published in 2017, he said. As there were not enough eligible candidates from the SC and ST communities for the examination at that time, a separate rank list was prepared for them, which was published on November 5.

Though there were four vacancies notified for the ST community, only one application was received, he said.