Thiruvananthapuram: The government machinery thinks above religious considerations when it comes to addressing the issue of flash floods in the city.
But efforts to raze a temple as part of Operation Anantha at Aryasala, notorious for flash floods, met with stiff resistance from VHP and BJP activists on Tuesday.
The activists stalled the operations for over four hours despite the presence of heavy police force and the revenue authorities, who were working day and night for the past several weeks on the mission, were surprised by the sudden change in the attitude.
The agitators demanded Rs 15 lakh as compensation for relocating the temple in advance.
The tahasildar who arrived on the scene for negotiations failed to calm down the agitators who demanded postponement of the demolition until the government sanctions Rs 15 lakh offered by collector Biju Prabhakar.
Soon sub-collector S Karthikeyan arrived and he succeeded in reaching a consensus after half-an-hour talks.
A senior official associated with the drive said the temple authorities had already relocated the idol and they were even allotted land for installing the idol.
“They are simply making a scene out of nothing. A consensus was reached long back and initially we tried to clear the drain without demolishing the structure. However, we later found it impossible and removal of the structure was necessary,” said the official.
Aryasala Manoj, one of the agitators, said the government’s attitude towards religious organisations was discriminatory.
“They have one law for Hindus and another for Muslims. We want them to immediately release the funds and we don’t trust this system. Once they demolish this, we will not get the compensation,” he said. The entire structure was demolished within three hours.
