High court appoints administrator to manage Ekvira temple in Pune

MUMBAI: The Bombay high court (HC) directed the appointment of a board of administrators to oversee the management of Ekvira temple at Pune.

The decision comes after the observation that politicians try to take over the management of the temple trusts for vested interests and thus hinder its development.

The bench held that as the management of temples and utilisation of its donations were being done in a better way by the board of administrators, therefore, the day to day running of the temples should also be handed over to them.

The division bench of justices B R Gavai and M S Karnik was hearing a civil application in the writ petition filed by some people who claimed to be the members of the management of Shri Ekvira Devastan Trust against another group of people who also claimed to be members of management.

Both groups claimed to be the rightful member of the management by filing ‘change reports’, a document for claiming membership of the management, with the assistant charity commissioner.

As the dispute between both groups failed to get resolved, the assistant charity commissioner, through an order, said that donation boxes would be opened in the presence of a member from each group and the amount recovered from the box would be deposited in the name of a trust in a nationalised bank, till the issue of change was not resolved.

The petitioners, however, alleged that despite the order of the assistant charity commissioner, the other group was misappropriating the funds.

After hearing both the sides, the bench said, “Till the issue is not resolved, a board of administrators consisting of civil judge, junior division, assistant charity commissioner and a tehsildar would oversee the functioning of Shri Ekvira Devastan Trust.