VIJAYAWADA: Stating that the Hindu institutions have become centres for rehabilitation of politically unemployed people, former Chief Secretary IYR Krishna Rao has written a letter to Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu seeking measures to prevent recurrence of incidents like the one that happened at Kanaka Durga temple. He said that skewed selection process for appointing trust board members was resulting in political interference in administration of Temples.
In the letter written to the CM on Monday, Krishna Rao said that the Durga Temple incident reflected the manifestation of a much deeper rot in the administration of Hindu religious institutions due to excess bureaucratic and political interference. “Government appoints trust board members to most of these institutions, but their selection leaves a lot to be desired. These institutions have become centres for rehabilitation of politically unemployed and for dispensing political patronage,” he said.
He cited the example of Tirumala Tirupathi Devasthanams’ board member J Sekhar Reddy who was arrested following income tax raids and seizure of large quantity of gold and cash. The former CS said that he was aware of several other corrupt people who functioned as chairmen of TTD trust board. He observed that Supreme Court had given a directive that temples with less than Rs 5 lakh income should be left to fend for themselves.
“Unless the state government honours the Supreme Court judgment in its letter and spirit, we are going to have an insensitive and corrupt bureaucracy damaging the very existence of these temples,” he added. He further said that the process of recruitment of staff for management of temples also need to be looked into.
The government should stop looking at temples as sources of revenue, he said. “I tried to flag these issues when I was with the government both as Chief Secretary as well as Chairman of the Archaka Welfare Trust. But, I did not have much of a success. Now that the issues are getting manifested in terms of the maladministration, I request the CM ‘s personal attention to the issue,” he concluded.