Chennai: Eviction of tenants from temple lands opposed

Chennai: With the Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments department evicting the long time residents of temple lands, tenants are up in arms against the department’s move to label residents defaulting rents as encroachers and evicting them.

“They (tenants) were living in temple lands for generations. They had built the houses on temple lands from their hard earned money. They were paying rents fixed by HR and CE department. But the department is forcing the tenants to give in writing to donate the building to the temple. Those who are refusing to give in writing are forcefully evicted,” alleges senior CPI leader D. Pandian.

He pointed to the evictions carried out in Padi, Thiruthuraipoondi and Courtallam. Over 25 lakh families are living in temple lands in the state.

He said it all started when the then DMK government in 2007 fixed rents for people living in the temple lands.

“The rents were hiked by 10 to 15 times with retrospective effect. Many people who were paying '300 a month were issued notice asking them to pay '5 lakh to '7 lakh,” he said, noting that the then Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi stayed its implementation when his party MLA Y. Sivapunniyam raised the issue in the Assembly.

“When the new government came to power, the rent hike was implemented with a renewed vigour,” he said.

Pandian demanded the state government to end uncertainty of the people living in temple lands by signing a lease agreement with them instead of collecting monthly rents.

“The government should immediately stop issuing notices and demolition of the buildings in the name of encroachments,” he said, demanding formation of a committee to fix rents as per the Fair Rent Act. A conference will be held here on August 29 to press these demands, he said.  

Tamil Nadu Temple Land Residents Association president V. A. Balasubramanian said the revenue for temples would go up by 500 times if they gave away the lands  to residents at concessional rate and deposit the money in bank.

“It will be a win- win situation for both the temple authorities as well as residents,” he said, pointing to the similar method adopted by Kerala government way back in 1960s.