Employees of the Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments (HR&CE) Department and temple staff on Saturday staged a hunger fast urging officials not to take “unnecessary action” against staff unless allegations against them are proven.
The State president of the Federation of All HR&CE Associations N.L. Sridharan said that in the case relating to the Palani Murugan statue, a few people were being targeted.
“The statue was replaced after due study and only because it was needed. In some cases, people are questioning why collection for certain idols were less. Public contributions are usually not much in temples,” he explained.
The employees are also opposing a suggestion to convert the department into a board.
“It was a board earlier, and at that time, a lot of lands belonging to temples had to be given up since nobody took interest in taking care of temples in the State,” he said.
He said that a lot of wrong information about the functioning of the department was being shared on the social media without any basic knowledge of how the department functions. For instance, during counting of hundi collection in temples, bank officials, members of the public and temple officials take part. “We cannot pocket any money,” he explained.
In Tiruchi too, employees of the department and temple staff staged a dharna to register their protest against attempts to tarnish their image.
