Who may enter a place of worship are “not facets of gender discrimination” but are rooted in religious practice, belief and the specific character of the deity, the Centre told the Supreme Court on Tuesday, right before the top court is set to hear the long-pending review petitions filed against its 2018 judgment permitting entry of women of all ages into Kerala’s renowned Sabarimala temple.
The ban on women (between ages 10-50) at Sabarimala stems from Lord Ayyappa’s nature as Naishtika Brahmachari, not impurity or inferiority, the Centre said in written submission filed ahead of the hearing.
“Allowing entry (of women) would alter the very nature of worship here, undermining religious pluralism protected by the Constitution. Devotees, i.e., both men and women, have for centuries worshipped Lord Ayyappa at Sabarimala in accordance with the temple’s established traditions,” Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, representing the Centre, told the court.
The Centre urged the top court to uphold the restriction on entry of women of menstruating age into Kerala’s Sabarimala temple, arguing that the issue falls squarely within the domain of religious faith and denominational autonomy and lies beyond the scope of judicial review.
It cautioned the bench against adopting standards of review that assess religious practices on grounds such as “rationality,” “modernity,” or “scientific defensibility.”
Such an exercise, it said, would amount to courts substituting their own philosophical views for the internal understanding of a faith.
“An inquiry into whether a practice is rational, acceptable to judicial sensibilities or aligned with transformative constitutional doctrines is not constitutional review,” the Centre said, adding that judges are neither trained nor institutionally equipped to interpret religious texts or adjudicate theological questions.