COVID-19 is likely to affect this year’s Vallasadya as well as the annual snakeboat regatta Uthrittathi Vallamkali at Aranmula.
The two-month-long annual season of Vallasadya, a feast served to the snakeboat crew by devotees as their offering to the presiding deity at the Sree Parthasarathy temple at Aranmula, is expected to start on August 4. The Ashtami-Rohini Vallasadya, a mega feast attended by around 75,000 people on the Sree Krishna Janmashtami day, is scheduled to be held on the Aranmula temple premises on September 10.
The fate of this year’s Uthrittathi Vallamkali, a snakeboat regatta in the Pampa river, held in the last lap of the Onam festival too hangs in the balance owing to the restrictions imposed on people’s movement as part of the drive to check the spread of the infection.
The Palliyoda Seva Sanghom (PSS), an apex body of 52 Palliyoda karayogams with their own snakeboats (palliyodams), organises these annual events in association with the Travancore Devaswom Board (TDB).
103 bookings
PSS secretary P.R. Radhakrishnan said the sanghom had started bookings for the Vallasadya at its office in Aranmula much earlier. A total of 103 bookings had been made till March 18 when it was stopped in the wake of a lockdown declared in the district following detection of five COVID-19 cases in Ranni.
Mr. Radhakrishnan said at least 100 people were required for launching a snakeboat from the boatshed into the river. Moreover, 70-odd oarsmen wearing masks while singing the rhythmic Vanchippattu (songs in praise of Lord Krishna) as its main accompaniment, complying with the two-metre physical distancing norm, would be grossly impractical, he said.
Likely exception
However, he said, the PSS would explore the possibility of conducting the legendary Thiruvonathoni Varavu, a procession carrying articles for the Onasadya (feast) at the Aranmula temple from the Kattoor Maha Vishnu temple ghats on the eve of Thiruvonam, he said.
