Tamil Nadu - Madurai   

Court slaps fine on petitioner

Staff Reporter

For squatting on temple land

MADURAI: In a judgement that would come handy for the Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments Department to evict thousands of illegal occupiers of temple lands, the Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court on Thursday imposed heavy costs on one of the squatters.

Dismissing a writ petition filed by S. Palanisamy, who claimed right over the property belonging to Sri Angalamman Temple at Korikadavu village in Dindigul district, Justice R. Banumathi directed the petitioner to pay Rs. 5,000 to the temple.

The petitioner claimed that the temple had entered into an agreement with him in 1980 and one of the temple land spread over 1.46 acres was leased out to him at the rate of Rs.12,000 per annum.

While he had been peacefully cultivating the lands for the past 25 years, the temple authorities on July 26, 2004, issued an auction notice for renting out the property to other persons. Hence, he challenged the auction notice on the ground that the property was governed by the Tamil Nadu Public Trusts (regulation of administration of agricultural lands) Act, 1961.

Contrary to petitioner's claim, the Judge, on perusing the records, found that the temple neither entered into a lease agreement as claimed by the petitioner, nor was bound by the TNPT Act. "The property owned by the temple is the property owned by the religious institution and not by any trust," she said.

Stating that the temple had erroneously filed an eviction petition under the TNPT Act during 1986, the Judge said, the squatter could not take advantage of the same to claim that he was a cultivating tenant.

The Judge further pointed out that the petitioner had successfully bid the land in an auction conducted by the temple in 1980. As per the auction conditions, he was supposed to cultivate the land for a year and give 40 bags of paddy to the deity.

But he failed to fulfil the conditions.

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