The Madras High Court Bench here has refused to ban the sale of a book on history of the Mangalanathar-Mangaleswari Temple at Uthirakosamangai in Ramanathapuram district just because the author had not been permitted either by the trustees or Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments (HR and CE) Department to write the book.
Disposing of a writ appeal preferred by the temple, represented by its hereditary trustee belonging to Ramanathapuram Samasthana Devasthanam, a Division Bench of Justices T.S. Sivagnanam and P. Velmurugan said that an order passed on the issue by a single judge of the High Court on March 15 does not call for any interference by them.
The Division Bench pointed out that P. Thangavelu, author of the Tamil book Easan Easwari Pirantha Oor Thiru Uthirakosamangai Thiruthala Varalaru , had filed the writ petition early this year with a plea to forbear the local police officials from preventing him and his representatives from selling his book outside the temple complex.
During the course of hearing of the writ petition, Inspector of Thiru Uthirakosamangai Police Station appeared before the court and based on his instructions, an Additional Government Pleader gave an undertaking to the single judge that the police shall not cause any kind of hindrance to the petitioner in selling his books outside the temple.
Observing that the stand taken by the police was perfectly in order, the Bench led by Mr. Justice Sivagnanam pointed out that the issue relating to ban on sale of books had been dealt with elaborately by the First Division Bench led by former Chief Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul in the case related to famous author Perumal Murugan’s Tamil novel Madhorubagan .
In that case, the court had said: “Whether the society is ready to read a particular book and absorb what it says without being offended is a debate which has been raging for years together. Times have changed. What was not acceptable earlier became acceptable later. Lady Chatterley’s Lover is a classical example of it.
“The choice to read is always with the reader. If you do not like a book, throw it away. There is no compulsion to read a book. Literary tastes may vary and what is right and acceptable to one may not be so to others. Yet, the right to write is unhindered.”
In so far as the present writ appeal was concerned, the judges said the temple could not have any grievance since the relief sought for in the writ petition was only against the police. They rejected the temple’s contention that the other legal remedies available to it might get foreclosed on account of the single judge’s order.
“We do not find any basis for such an apprehension since while granting relief to the writ petitioner, the court only directed the respondent police and that too after recording their undertaking... However, we make it clear that the appellant/temple, if aggrieved, is entitled to work out their remedies in accordance with law,” the judges concluded.
