Only Hindus will Head Devaswom Boards: Kerala High Court
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Oct 27, 2018, 06:20 pm IST
The High Court ruling deals a severe blow to CPM’s sinister move to appoint non-Hindus to key posts in the Kerala Hindu temple administration board
Kerala High Court ruled on October 26, that only Hindus can come to the helm of Dewaswoms. The rule is in the wake of petitions filed by BJP state president Adv. P.S. Sreedharan Pillai, Hindu Aikya Vedi general secretary R.V Babu and former Thiruvithamkoor Dewaswom Board chairman and Congress leader Prayar Gopalakrishnan challenging the removal of the qualification that Dewaswom Commissioner must be a Hindu. The challenge was to the amendments in the law, removing the word “Hindu” from Section 29 (2) dealing with the appointment of Dewasom Commissioner.
High Court had issued a notice to the Government of Kerala (GOK) on October 16 in the light of the writ petition. The court had directed that an affidavit should be filed by the Government of Kerala stating that only Hindus will be appointed as Dewaswom Commissioner. The court recorded the undertaking given by the Advocate General that the government would file the affidavit. Accordingly, the case was posted to today, October 26, 2018, for further proceedings.
The initial Bill introduced in the House clearly provided that only Additional Secretary to the Government who is a Hindu should be appointed, on deputation, as Dewaswom Commissioner. But, when the Dewaswom Minister introduced the amendments at the final state of the proceedings of the House, the word “Hindu” was omitted.
The idea behind the amendment was to appoint non-Hindus as Dewaswom Board Commissioners. The amendments made do violate the country’s Constitution and the covenant executed for the formation of the United State of Travancore and Cochin, for the preservation of customs, traditions and usages in temple affairs.
This is a clear set back to the CPM-led LDF government’s sinister plot to demolish the Hindu traditions by diluting the temple management. The incident reminds one the appointment of a Christian as the member of the Dewaswom Board of the world famous Guruvayoor temple in the 1990s during the regime of the Congress veteran K. Karunakaran as the CM. And, J. Thampi had to resign due to stiff opposition and agitation led by RSS-inspired organisations. It was called Temple Liberation Struggle led by prominent Hindu leaders like Kummanam Rajasekharan and others.
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