Supreme Court's verdict on entry of women in Sabarimala tomorrow

Supreme Court will pronounce its verdict Friday on a batch of petitions on entry of women between the ages of 10 to 50 at the Sabarimala temple in Kerala, reports said.

Supreme Court reserved the verdictOn August 1. A five-judge Constitution bench headed by Chief Justice Dipak Misra asked the counsels of both sides to compile the submissions and submit before these within seven days.

The bench comprises Chief Justice Dipak Misra, Justices RF Nariman, AM Khanwilkar, DY Chandrachud and Indu Malhotra. The Indian Young Lawyers Association, among the petitioners challenging the ban, had filed its plea in the top court in 2006, but the case lay in cold storage till it was finally taken up for hearing in January 2016.

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The apex court had said that the constitutional scheme prohibiting exclusion has "some value" in a "vibrant democracy".

In July, the bench had said that it cannot remain "oblivious" of the fact that the entry of women in the age group of 10-50 was barred into the shrine on "physiological ground" of menstruation.

The management of the Sabarimala temple, located on a hilltop in the Western Ghats of Pathanamthitta district, had earlier told the top court that the ban on entry of women aged between 10 and 50 years was because they cannot maintain "purity" on account of menstruation.

However, the Kerala government last year had informed the Supreme Court that it favoured the entry of women of all age groups in the temple.

In 2007, the Left Democratic Front (LDF) government had taken a progressive standby favouring women's entry into the temple, which was later overturned by the Congress-led United Democratic Front (UDF) dispensation.