In a hearing that saw high drama, the Supreme Court on Friday came to the verge of removing K.N. Satheesh, the executive officer for Sree Padmanabha Swamy temple in Kerala, for his rash allegations against the Travancore royal family.
The hearing witnessed a bench of Justices T.S. Thakur and Anil R. Dave give a dressing-down to Mr. Satheesh, a senior IAS officer, after calling him to the front row of the courtroom.
Justice Thakur told an apologetic Mr. Satheesh that he should not be "carried away by ideologies, revolutionaries and politics" when dealing with the Supreme Court in his capacity as the temple executive officer.
This is the first time that the apex court has turned against the new management of the temple after it took away the temple's administration from the hands of the royal family.
Trouble started for Mr. Satheesh, when senior advocate K.K. Venugopal, representing the royal family members, complained about "wild" allegations penned by Mr. Satheesh against his clients in an affidavit to the court.
Reading out excerpts from the report, Mr. Venugopal said the executive officer has even taken exception to the half-hour slot given to the royal family every morning to exclusively enter the temple to offer prayers. Mr. Venugopal said the officer said this practice was reminiscent of the social evil of untouchability of the past era.
The royal family accused Mr. Satheesh of making unfounded allegations against them like approaching him for "favours" and even "threatening" him.
Mr. Venugopal then publicly confronted Mr. Satheesh in open courtroom, with royal family members present. He challenged Mr. Satheesh to spill the beans and name the family members who approached him surreptitiously for favours.
"Nobody approached me personally. Some people used to call saying they are cousin of so and so..." Mr. Satheesh said in court.
Justice Thakur asked Mr. Satheesh as to why he did not go to the police or the temple administrative committee if he had been threatened.
The court slammed the "lectures" given by Mr. Satheesh about untouchability in "modern times" and other derogatory comments. It asked amicus curiae and senior advocate Gopal Subramanium whether Mr. Satheesh's conduct should be considered an aberration or should he be immediately removed from his post to make way for a more "sober" person.
"We have already said the royal family's customary rights will continue till we make a final decision. We have taken everything, all they command, away from them except this time half-hour time slot to pray. Because of them the temple exists, they established the temple... but now you want to take that away from them..." Justice Thakur addressed Mr. Satheesh.
"You seem to be a gentleman... Please understand, the times of privy purses are over and there may come a time when the royal families may go... but till then traditions will continue..." Justice Thakur told Mr. Satheesh, who apologised later.
The court asked him to withdraw his affidavit and file afresh, after which the court would take a call on his fate.
Meanwhile, the court directed the audit of the trust for the period between 2004-2014 by former comptroller and auditor general Vinod Rai to be completed soon and an audit report to be submitted in court.
The court further left the decision on what divine song need to be sung for the deity to be best decided by the spiritual heads of the temple.
In his submissions, Mr. Subramanium said the new mechanism of transparency in administration has started showing results with the temple gaining financial strength, premises neat and clean and no instances of pilferage being reported.
