Madras High Court stays government order on temple lands

Chennai: The Madras high court has stayed, until further orders, a portion of a government order in so far as it relates to regularisation of temple lands, which are encroached, are concerned.

 A division bench comprising Justices M.Sathyanarayanan and N.Seshasayee granted the interim stay on a petition filed by A. Radhakrishnan of Salem, challenging the decision of the government to issue patta to 'non-objectionable' encroachers of temple lands.

 Staying a portion of the order issued by the revenue and disaster management department, the bench said after weighing rival submissions, this court finds that prima facie there is merit in the submissions made in aid of an order for stay of Para 2 (v) of the impugned government order. Any attempt to regularise encroachments and sanctifying encroachment is more likely to denude the temples of their properties and any act that involves loss of properties of the temples for the purposes other than those intended for the benefit or necessity of the temples may well contravene the spirit behind section 34 of the Act and this process would also more likely to render section 78 of the HR & CE act otiose, bench added. The case posted to Jan. 20, for hearing.