Temple cash: Notice to TS

 HYDERABAD: The Telangana High Court on Wednesday issued notices to the principal secretary and endowment commissioner in a petition challenging the inaction of the authorities in exempting temples, whose annual income was less than Rs five lakh from the purview of the Telangana Charitable Hindu Religious Institutions and Endowments Act, 1987.

Nagilla Srinivas of Akhila Bharata Hindu Mahasabha and two others filed the petition complaining that despite the Supreme Court’s judgement in the Devi Kodandaram Sarma and others vs. State of Andhra Pradesh case, authorities in Telangana were yet to take any action in this regard.

The petitioners submitted that over 10, 000 temples, whose annual income was less than Rs five lakh, are registered with the state endowments department. As they were not being exempted from the purview of Endowments Act 1987, the temples are paying between Rs 37,000 and Rs 92,500 as mandatory contributions every year. This is adversely hitting the financial stability of such temples, the petitioners said.