In Pictures: Kerala’s Attukal Pongala— When The World’s Largest Gathering Of Women Comes Together To Offer Pongala To Goddess Bhagavathy In Thiruvananthapuram

Attukal Pongala is the ten-day annual temple festival of the Attukal Bhagavathy temple in Thiruvananthapuram. On the ninth day of the festival, lakhs of women from across the state gather in the streets of Thiruvananthapuram to prepare Pongala (a rice pudding made with jaggery, coconut, milk and banana) for Goddess Bhagavathy.

Makeshift cooking stoves are set up using bricks and earthen pots across the city for this purpose.

The cooking of Pongala by the gathering of women starts after the lighting of the Pongala hearths in the temple premises.

It is believed that Kannagi of the Tamil epic Silappadikaram has manifested as the Goddess in this temple. While she was returning after cursing the city of Madurai for putting her husband Kovalan to death on charges of stealing the Queen’s anklet, she took the form of a little girl and stopped at Attukal. There she asked an old man for help to cross the river. The old man took her home but she disappeared that night and later told him in a dream that he should build a temple at the spot where she had drawn three lines on the ground.

The gathering set a world record in 2009 when two and a half million women devotees participated. This year, the number of participants is expected to be higher because the festival is being organised on its usual scale for the first time after the coronavirus pandemic.