the chariot procession runs at about 1 a.m. on 15 August, drawing roughly a lakh of pilgrims, including many from Kerala
present day
Little Rome today
Vadakkankulam today is an overwhelmingly Catholic town, and a remarkably literate one: the 2011 census puts the whole town at 9,220 people, 94 per cent of them able to read. The parish counts some 10,500 Catholics in around 4,000 families, organised through Basic Christian Communities; the diocese's own roll gives about 7,350 in some 1,600. The great August Perunkoor feast still draws close to a lakh of pilgrims for the chariot procession in the small hours of 15 August — the Tamil daily Maalaimalar reported as much in 2022, many of them crossing over from Kerala — and the parish keeps its faithful close through the monthly magazine Vadavai Matha Malar and its own live broadcasts.
Parish traditionThis moment rests on 4 sources.
What this source establishes
The only external, non-parish witness to the living cult of this shrine — a major Tamil daily, reporting the crowd. It is the sole support for "close to a lakh of pilgrims", and until now it was not in the bibliography at all.