Summary:
Chennai, Sep 22 (PTI) The Madras High Court on Wednesday lambasted the Joint Commissioner of the Tamil Nadu Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments (HR&CE ) department for filing a counter-affidavit in response to a PIL petition, allegedly in a "cavalier manner".
"The cavalier manner in which the counter-affidavit has been prepared cries out for immediate action to be taken against the Joint Commissioner, including for contempt.
Indeed, the arrogance of the Joint Commissioner knows no bounds as he suggests in the last paragraph of the affidavit that the procedure contemplated in the HR&CE Act, 1959 is cumbersome and therefore time-limit may not be fixed," the first bench of Chief Justice Sanjib Banerjee and Justice P D Audikesavalu said.
The PIL petition filed by "Elephant" G Rajendran related to the missing of the copper plate at the Bakthavatsala Perumal temple in Tiruvarur district and the encroachment on its 400 acres of land.
The counter by the Joint Commissioner stated that the copper plate has been recovered and the petitioner"s grievance in such regard has been taken care of.
"However, what is alarming is that paragraph 6 of the counter-affidavit filed by the Joint Commissioner reveals that the temple administration has identified 206.93 acres of land belonging to the temple and uploading process in the HR & CE website is going on".