Thiruvananthapuram: Christ church, Palayam, one of the oldest churches in Trivandrum city, has probably for the first time rescheduled the Sunday morning service as Attukal pongala is being held on the same day. Attukal pongala will be held on February 25. In an exemplary gesture, the Church committee considered the fact that pongala pots will be lined up along the street and all around the church and devouts will come in droves by Sunday morning. The Sunday service will be held as a combined service in the evening at 5.30 pm.

"We deliberated on aspects like parking, traffic issues, access and decided that the service may be rescheduled. We left the final decision to the vicar who also aligned with the proposal to reschedule the service," said Saji Sam George, Church Secretary.

The church offers service in Tamil at 6 am, in English at 7.30am and Malayalam at 9.45 am. Each service is attended by 60-400 members. The congregation has around 1400 families. He said that Sunday service has rarely been rescheduled. Even during Covid times, morning services were held online. " This time, we thought of revising the timing because we wanted to avoid any kind of hassle to the members of our congregation and the pongala devotees. Earlier we didn't have to think about it, because Pongala would be held on other days," said George.

Over the years, there has been a steady annual increase in the number of devotees coming to offer pongala. The entire city stretches are dotted with pongala pots. What was once confined to the core areas of the city has stretched out to the outskirts of the city. Slots are marked and reserved with thread tied over the bricks a day ahead of pongala in the streets.