In recent days, the office of the Department of Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments at Nungambakkam has been flooded with tenants of temple properties, lessees and encroachers, who are under pressure to respond to the Department’s notice on payment default and other issues ever since the DMK returned to power. Minister P.K. Sekarbabu listens to all of them and explains the legal and department’s position even as he chalks out a plan for retrieving temple lands. “We will soon establish temples’ ownership of 4,30,000 acres,” he told The Hindu in an interview.
How far have you succeeded in reclaiming temple lands?
Temples under the Department own over 5,30,000 acres. As directed by the Chief Minister, we started matching our records with those of the Department of Revenue. So far, we have established temples’ ownership of 3,30,000 acres. We have also filed over 30,000 appeals with the Department of Revenue. We have created a website, Tamilnilam, and uploaded the details of the assets of all temples. The work is also under way to upload the temple documents running to 4 crore pages. A map of temple properties is being created with the help of modern equipment used for land survey. These measures were never taken in the past. Our aim is to protect temple lands and inform people of their status. We will be able to establish temples’ ownership of four lakh acres with proper documents in six-nine months. We will fence the land and erect notice boards. Be it encroachers or lessees or tenants who have not paid rents, we will take legal action to reclaim temple assets.
What is your response to the critics who have questioned the decision to melt temple jewellery to convert them into gold bars?
Devotees offer gold jewellery, silverware and money in fulfilment of their wishes. After keeping what is necessary for a temple, we have decided to melt the gold at the government mint in Mumbai. The gold bars thus made will be deposited under the gold monetisation scheme in nationalised banks, and the interest thereof will be used for the upkeep of temples. It has been the practice since 1976. Sometimes the gold was used for making temple cars and paving the roof of the sanctum sanctorum . The scheme is being effectively implemented at the Tirupati temple. In the last 10 years, the jewellery that were not used had been kept in bundles. We will not melt even a bit of jewellery that were donated to temples by kings and zamindars and are used traditionally for decorating the deities. There is no plan to melt the new offerings if they meet temples requirements. What we are going to melt is broken and small pieces of jewellery that cannot be used. We have appointed D. Raju, former judge of the Supreme Court; Mala, former judge of the Madras High Court; and Justice K. Ravichandrababu of the Madras High Court to oversee the process. The entire process will be recorded. We will get crores of rupees a year through the gold monetisation scheme, and the amount could be used for the maintenance of hundreds of temples. The gold bars can be brought back if there is a need for jewellery. Our motto is temple wealth is meant only for god. But a section is raising doubts about the scheme only to prevent the government from earning the goodwill of people.
How much jewellery do the temples own?
There was six kg of gold when the offerings made to the Mariamman temple at Samyapuram were counted. If six kg of gold could be collected in three months, take into account the offerings made to innumerable temples in the last 10 years. There will be over 1,000 kg.
You have announced 10 new arts and science colleges. Is there a need for them when there are so many arts and science colleges?
Even in Chennai, every year thousands of students could not get admission to government, government-aided and private colleges. We run two colleges at Palani, one at Kanniyakumari, one at Courtallam and one at Poompuhar. At Palani, we received 8,000 applications, though the total number of seats is just 1,200. There is a need for more colleges. We will launch courses such as BBA and B.Com that are in demand. Spiritual classes are compulsory at our colleges. Depending on the demand, we will introduce various courses. The Department will dedicate itself to the economic and spiritual development of people.
BJP State president Annamalai has urged the government to allow worship at temples
The State government is following the guidelines issued by the Union Home Ministry. The threat of a third wave of COVID-19 has not receded yet. When we came to power, there were over 36,000 active cases, and around 100 patients died every day. In Kerala, daily cases stand at 20,000; but it has come down to over 1,500 in State. When I was on a pilgrimage to Sabarimala, people told me that Kerala should learn how to control the pandemic from Tamil Nadu. It is not just Hindu temples; churches and mosques are not allowed to conduct worship on Fridays, Saturday and Sundays. But regular pujas are performed. Do not add any religious colour to the issue.
