India woman makes historic trek to 'banned' mountain peak as sexism row rumbles on
An Indian woman has shattered another gender barrier in the country this week after climbing a mountain from which women were previously banned.
Dhanya Sanal, a spokesperson for India’s Ministry of Defence, scaled the 6,128-ft-high Agasthyakoodam peak in the southern state of Kerala on Monday, weeks after the provincial high court rescinded the ban imposed by the indigenous Kani tribe against women climbing it.
For generations, the Kani people have opposed female presence on the slopes of Agasthyakoodam, believing their presence would ‘desecrate’ the sanctity of the statue of their celibate Hindu god Agastya Muni, which sits at the summit.
Last November the Kerala high court ruled in response to a petition by women activists that restrictions on ascending the mountain, located some 30 miles from the state capital Thiruvananthapuram, cannot be gender based.
It also summarily dismissed the Kani people’s plea that the verdict offended their beliefs and that allowing women onto the peak would ‘slight’ their god's celibacy.
Armed with the court order and dressed in jeans and a shirt, Ms Sanal, 38, made her way up the 14-mile-long, thickly forested route all the way to the summit.
She was the only woman in a group of around 100 trekkers, and on their way up they were confronted by a large number of Kanis who shouted slogans but made no move to stop her.
Earlier, Ms Sanal told the BBC that she had been prepared to turn back if the Kani people barred her way, but that never happened.
“We staged the protest to express our pain and anguish at breaking the customs of the Agastya hills,” local tribal leader Mohanan Triveni told the Press Trust India news agency, adding that he respected the court order.
Meanwhile, Hindu devotees in Kerala on Wednesday barred two more women from entering an ancient Hindu temple, in defence of a centuries-old ban on females of menstruating from praying inside it.
Earlier this month two women in their forties made history by secretly entering the Sabarimala temple - which is built on a mountainous tiger reserve - under police escort at dawn. They left undetected a short while later after praying inside it.
A Supreme Court ruling found that banning women aged between 10 and 50 years old from entering Sabarimala was unconstitutional and an infringement of human rights and of equality of worship.
However, protesters backed by supporters of prime minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, disregarded the court’s ruling and physically barred women from entering Sabarimala.
They justified their actions on the ground that long-standing religious sentiments prevailed over judicial rulings, and preventing women from entering the shrine was essential to appease Ayyappan, the temple's celibate deity.
