THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: A 50-year-old man set himself on and ran towards the Satyagraha pandal in front of Secretariat in the early morning hours on Thursday where BJP leader CK Padmanabhan has been on an indefinite hunger strike demanding revocation of prohibitory orders at Sabarimala . Venugopal, hailing from Muttada has been admitted to burns ICU at Medical college where his condition remains critical.The police said the incident happened at around 1.30 am on Thursday when Venugopal poured petrol over his body at Capital towers and set himself on fire. He ran towards the pandal where around 50 BJP activists were present. The cops and BJP activists doused the fire and rushed him to hospital.Read in MalyalamBJP leader MT Ramesh said that the suicide bid shows how Ayyappa devotees are reacting emotionally to the government’s stringent norms at Sabarimala. "Sabarimala issue is triggering an emotional movement. He was an Ayyappa devotee. He was saying that his move was a protest against injustice to temple and he was chanting Ayyappa mantras. It was a narrow escape, it could have been a huge disaster. Government has failed in providing security to Satyagraha pandal," said MT Ramesh.BJP had launched an indefinite hunger strike at Secretariat on December 3 in protest against the government’s ill treatment of BJP leader K Surendran who was arrested and recently released on bail. BJP leader AN Radhakrishnan who began the hunger strike was recently shifted to hospital after his health condition deteriorated.

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