Temples must be liberated from government control

“India, that is Bharat…” When the framers of our Constitution used these words and in that sequence in its very first Article, they were conscious of certain facts: One, India is just a new name of our country Bharat, which is homeland to our millennia-old civilisation, which gave birth to four major religions—Hinduism, Jainism, Buddhism and Sikhism—and which primarily informed our ancient civilisational ethos and culture; two, the Indian State is the inheritor and trustee of our ancient civilisation; three, the preambular exhortation of “unity and integrity of the Nation” has a civilisational connotation as deep civilisational ties bound us spatially and inter-generationally, spanning across yugas. Thus, they were cognizant of India as a civilisational nation whose unity and integrity was primarily informed by Sanatana Dharma eons before they assembled to frame the Constitution. Therefore, the moral obligation of the Constitution was largely to nurture our ancient civilisation and its values with a view to reintegrate our nation and its people. For, bereft of those there will be no “India” in India, as a mere geographical lump alone does not make a nation.

GOVERNMENT TAKEOVER OF HINDU TEMPLES IS ANTI-CIVILISATIONAL

Temples and muths are life and soul of Hinduism, just as churches and mosques are for Christianity and Islam. The institutional capacity for self-correction and self-defence, sustenance of the priestly class, artistes and various service occupations and crafts has traditionally come from the perennial income generated by the temples and muths. They helped organic growth of religious leadership, and of resource capacity to serve the needy and destitute in terms of education, hospitals, orphanages and old age homes.

A secular state, by definition, cannot control and manage religious institutions, that too of only one religion. Article 26 of the Constitution bestows the fundamental right on all religions, irrespective of majority or minority, to establish and maintain institutions for religious and charitable purposes, to manage their own affairs, and to own, acquire and administer property thereof.

If there were allegations of mismanagement in certain temples, then government intervention could be only for a very limited period as per Article 31A(1) (b) of the Constitution to set things right in that temple. The honourable Supreme Court has also reiterated the same in the Chidambaram temple case.

Despite constitutional provisions, Hindu temples continue to be controlled and routinely taken over by state governments, whereas mosques and churches are allowed to be exclusively managed by the respective communities even though Article 26 confers the right equally upon all sections of citizens.

Moreover, the state control of temples is doubly prejudicial for Hindus in that they have not only lost control of their temples to the government but because of that very reason of temples being under the control of government, it becomes a part of “the State” as per Article 12 of the Constitution. As a result, the centuriesold religious customs, festivals and practices get challenged and interfered with selectively and unduly.

Sabarimala is a prominent case in point. Had the Sabarimala shrine not been under government control, Part-III of the Constitution would not have been applicable to it, and there would not have been judicial intervention into the age old religious customs and practices of Sabarimala.

Evidently, with the denial of the right to manage their own temples, the “majority” Hindus in India fare no differently from minority dhimmis as in certain theocratic countries. Deprived of resources and institutions, Hinduism has been decaying. Clearly, the religious rights of Hindus count for nothing, and states can trample on them at will. So much for religious freedom for majority Hindus.

GOVERNMENT TAKEOVER OF HINDU TEMPLES IN KERALA

Five Devaswom Boards namely, the Travancore Devaswom Board, the Cochin Devaswom Board, Malabar Devaswom Board, the Guruvayoor Devaswom Board and the Koodalmanickam Devaswom Board have been constituted by the Kerala government under the Travancore-Cochin Hindu Religious Institutions Act 1950, the Madras Hindu Religious Act and Charitable Endowment

Act 1951, the Guruvayoor Devaswom Act 1978 and the Koodalmanickam Devaswom Act 2005, respectively, to take over and manage Hindu temples. In 2015, the Kerala Devaswom Recruitment Board Act was enacted to provide for common recruitment to various posts in all Devaswom Boards and their institutions.

A total of 3,002 Hindu temples are managed by the Travancore Devaswom Board (1,249), the Cochin Devaswom Board (403), Malabar Devaswom Board (1,337), the Guruvayoor Devaswom Board (12), and the Koodalmanickam Devaswom Board (1). All these temples together have tens of thousands of crores worth properties. Their combined annual income is more than Rs 1,000 crore. The Sree Padmanabha Swamy Temple, which has hundreds of crores of wealth and a substantial annual income, is managed by the Travancore royal family.

This has completely crippled Hindu society and its institutional capacity and resource ability to be selfsufficient and in presenting a unified front to address the religious problems both from within and outside.

Ruling parties of all hues have used Hindu temples to dole out political patronage in appointments of their party persons to the temple boards, thereby serving the vested political interests rather than Hindu society and Hindu Dharma.

Further, the governmentcontrolled temples have been turned into commercial enterprises, whereby the devotees have to pay for darshan and every other activity in the temple. This is outrageous, and is nothing but religious tax or jaziya imposed on Hindus.

Proselytizers cite the government-imposed system to vilify Hinduism by saying that Hindus have to pay money to visit their gods/ temples, to lure Hindus to convert.

Government control of temples has also led to a lot of perversions in temple management including appointment of non-Hindus or atheists, misuse and misappropriation of temple lands and properties, interference in age old rituals, customs, traditions etc.

HINDU SOCIETY ALONE SHOULD MANAGE TEMPLES DEMOCRATICALLY WITHOUT GOVERNMENT INTERFERENCE

A secular government has no business to take over and mange Hindu temples and their properties. Just as Christians, Muslims and Sikhs manage their own places of worship without government interference, it is high time that the government freed all Hindu temples to be managed by Hindu society democratically and without government interference. The Sikh gurudwara management model with suitable modifications can be an apt democratic model for governance of Hindu temples.

One of the authors of this piece, M. Nageswara Rao, IPS (Retd), has drafted a Model Temple Management Bill, which provides for:

(i) The access to Hindu religious institutions of public character to all classes and sections of Hindus with due regard to the religious customs of each such institution;

(ii) The management of Hindu religious institutions and administration of their properties through a body consisting of Hindu religious persons, and Hindu representatives of electoral colleges consisting of Hindus elected for the purpose for each such institution or for a group of such institutions, with the State exercising no control over the management or affairs of such institutions or administration of their properties; (iii) The appropriation of funds, properties and all resources of Hindu religious institutions only for the purposes of maintenance, development and construction of Hindu religious institutions; for the religious well-being of Hindus and the Hindu community; and for the preservation, promotion and propagation of Hinduism;

(iv) The prohibition of nonHindus from taking part in the management, administration or any other activity whatsoever, of the Hindu religious institutions and their properties;

(v) The protection by the State of all Hindu religious institutions and their properties from encroachment or illegal destruction;

(vi) The creation of state, district and local level Hindu Dharma Sabhas consisting of both religious and elected representatives of Hindu religious institutions, for the purposes of guidance, preservation, promotion and propagation of Hinduism.

As Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev recently, and rightly, said, “We live in times where we understand the government should not manage airlines, airports, industry mining, and trade. But how is it that sacred temples can be managed by government. What qualifies them?”

We therefore appeal to Honourable Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and his Kerala government to free all Hindu temples and religious institutions from government control by enacting a law providing for their democratic management by Hindu society without any government interference. We will be happy to assist the government in this exercise.

M. Nageswara Rao, IPS (Retd) is former In-Charge Director, CBI; P.K.D. Nambiar is a political analyst and marketing strategist.