The Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court on Friday granted stay on an amendment made to Rule 17 of the Tamil Nadu Hindu Religious Institutions Employees (Conditions of Service) Rules, 2020.
A Division Bench of Justices Pushpa Sathyanarayana and P. Velmurugan granted the stay and adjourned the hearing on the petition filed by Tamil Nadu Senior Grade Temple Staff Association of Meenakshi Sundareswarar Temple, Madurai.
The association, represented by its general secretary S. Sudharsanam, challenged the G.O. issued by Tourism, Culture and Religious Endowments Department in 2021 and the subsequent guidelines issued by the Commissioner of the Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments Department.
The amendment made to include sub-rule (4) of Rule 17 states that, “Notwithstanding anything contained in this rule, the Commissioner may, in the interest of administration of religious institutions, transfer employees of any religious institution to any other religious institution having an Executive Officer of the same grade”. Guidelines were issued in January, 2022.
The petitioner said the amendment made to the Rule was illegal and violative of the Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments Act, 1959. The amendment empowering the Commissioner to transfer any employee of a temple to another temple governed by the EO of the same cadre was illegal.
He said each religious institution was a separate entity. The Act empowered the trustees to administer the temples, make appointments, take disciplinary action, fix fees and prepare a scale of expenditure. The Act also mandated careful maintenance of registers by trustees of each institution.
Therefore, transfer of an employee from a temple to another temple was impermissible under the provisions of the Act. As per the Act, the power to transfer an employee was also vested with the trustees, he said.
The religious institutions differed from one to another by their religious practices, prevailing customs, agamas, deities, devotees, etc. Therefore, all temples could not be placed on the same pedestal so as to treat their employees uniformly. Income of one temple differed from another. An employee who was receiving a particular scale of pay and allowances might not get the same in the temple to which he was transferred, the petitioner said.
