A leader of an influential socio-cultural organisation that represents a third of a dominant backward class community has accused the Congress and the BJP of trying to pull down Kerala’s Left Democratic Front government by fuelling protests in the name of the Sabarimala temple.

Vellapally Natesan, general secretary of the Sree Narayana Dharma Paripalana Yogam that represents the politically powerful Ezhava community, told a media conference in Alappuzha on Tuesday that he backed Kerala chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan for implementing the Supreme Court order that allowed women of all ages to enter the Sabarimala hill shrine to Lord Ayyappa.

Natesan upbraided the Congress and the BJP for fishing for political gains by changing their original stand to eventually join the devotees who have been protesting against the implementation of the court order.

“They have to think about the women and children who are being pushed on to streets for the protests. The attitude that the subjects (lower castes) have to follow the orders passed by the lords (upper castes) is not right,” he said.

“The chief minister has already said he is ready to discuss the matter with the stakeholders. So it’s not right to whip up such unrest,” Natesan said, defending Vijayan who has received flak for his government’s decision to implement the court order.

The Ezhava community that forms about 28 per cent of Kerala’s population has traditionally been the backbone of the CPM and the CPI. Vijayan belongs to a similar backward class called the Thiyya, whose members mostly live in north Kerala.

“They say the protesters are all Hindus. But they don’t seem to have thought about the Ezhavas who make up 28 per cent (of Kerala’s population) and the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes,” Natesan said.

He said his organisation would take along like-minded communities to start a counter-campaign to explain the “hollowness” of the arguments of the agitators.

“Not just Pinarayi Vijayan, but even a Congress government would have to implement such a verdict. I suspect a larger conspiracy in them continuing with the protests without waiting for the verdict on the review petitions,” Natesan said, referring to the five review pleas filed in the Supreme Court on Monday.

“The entry of women to the Sabarimala temple was stopped only after 1991. The protesters should understand this,” he said, calling for the protests to stop.

Vijayan had on Monday clarified that it was a PIL filed in 1990 that ended up in Kerala High Court prohibiting the entry of women in the menstrual age group of 10 to 50 years to the Sabarimala temple. “The chief minister has explained everything,” Natesan said.

No urgent hearing

The Supreme Court on Tuesday refused to accept a plea for “urgent” hearing of the batch of review petitions challenging the Sabarimala verdict. “The review petitions will be listed in the usual course,” Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi said.