CHENNAI: The first bench of Madras High Court on Friday refused to grant a stay on a single judge’s order on the appointment of temple priests without taking into account the caste of the person to be appointed.
When the appeal petition filed by Muthu Subramania Gurukkal of Salem challenging the order of the single judge came up for hearing, the counsel for the petitioner stressed an interim relief. However, the bench of Chief Justice SV Gangapurwala and Justice PD Audikesavalu refused to grant the relief without hearing the respondents.
Directing the official respondents to file their reply to the petition, the bench posted the matter to September 22 for further hearing.
Muthu Subramania Gurukkal had challenged the recent order of Justice N Anand Venkatesh who ruled that the pedigree based on caste will have no role to play in the appointment of Archagar if the person so selected satisfies the requirements.
The judge also pointed out that the Supreme Court has held that the appointment of an archagar is a secular function and hence there is no question of claiming a hereditary right. However, the archagar is expected to be a well-versed and accomplished person in the Agamas and rituals necessary to be performed in a temple.
He passed the orders on a writ petition filed against the powers of executive officers (EOs) to appoint archagars to the temples administered by the Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments (HR&CE) department.