For the first time since she returned to her Angadippuram home in Malappuram on January 15, Kanakadurga, who was one of the two women to enter Sabarimala temple after the Supreme Court verdict, met her children on Saturday. For the past two weeks, Kanakadurga had been living alone at her home since her husband and her mother-in-law moved out with her two children and were living in a rented flat.
The meeting was possible after the Child Welfare Committee granted Kanakadurga permission to meet her children. The three met at the CWC Centre in Malappuram on Saturday evening.
"I have met them and they both were happy to spend time with me. They want to stay with me but other family members have scared them by telling them things against me. I can meet them again next Saturday and they will be with me for a day," she tells TNM.
According to the CWC’s permissions, Kanakadurga can meet her children once every week. She can meet them for a day from 5 pm on Saturday to 5 pm on Sunday. This comes after she approached the CWC stating that her husband and his family members were not letting her meet her children.
The 39-year-old faced stiff opposition from her husband’s family over her Sabarimala visit on January 2 when she, along with Bindu Ammini, entered the sanctum sanctorum of the temple. Kanakadurga had left home on December 22, 2018, to worship at Sabarimala after the Supreme Court order lifted the ban on the entry of menstruating women into Sabarimala temple.
After their visit, the two women had to stay at an undisclosed location for several days as violent protests broke out across the state.
However, when she returned, a more painful experience awaited. Her family members did not allow her to stay at her home when she returned on January 15. She suffered a head injury when her mother-in-law, Sumathi Amma, hit her with a wooden plank following a verbal spat with her. She was admitted to a hospital for several days and after she was discharged, her family refused to accept her and she had to move to a home for women in Perinthalamanna run by the women’s resource centre Sakhi.
Kanakadurga had then moved a Gram Nyayalaya (village court) seeking the right to stay with her family. Though the court passed an interim order granting her the right to live in her husband's home, her husband Krishnan Unni and her mother-in-law moved to a rented house with the children.