TDB, Revenue dept lock horns over freezing of devaswom accounts

The revenue department has frozen the bank accounts of Travancore Devaswom Board (TDB) at Karunagappally and Kollam inviting angry reaction from the temple administration.
Travancore Devaswom Board manages the famous Lord Ayyappa temple at Sabarimala (File Photo)
Travancore Devaswom Board manages the famous Lord Ayyappa temple at Sabarimala (File Photo)

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The revenue department has frozen the bank accounts of Travancore Devaswom Board (TDB) at Karunagappally and Kollam inviting angry reaction from the temple administration. The accounts of TDB Karunagappally group at Dhanlaxmi Bank were frozen two months ago, while the account at the main branch of the bank in Kollam was frozen on Tuesday. The action has been taken for non-payment of lease arrears pertaining to the 31.55 acres of revenue land leased out to the Devaswom Board College at Sasthamkotta.

Though the office of Devaswom minister said the issue has been settled and the TDB will pay 10% of the arrears as first installment after which the Revenue department will de-freeze the accounts, TDB president K Ananthagopan rejected the conditions. The agreement was reached after Devaswom Minister K Radhakrishnan held discussions with Revenue Minister K Rajan.

“We will not pay the arrears. We have submitted a memorandum to the chief minister and revenue and devaswom ministers to allot the land for the college and we are hopeful that the demand will be accepted. The government had announced a special scheme in 2011-16 period to allot the land leased to aided educational institutions at a nominal rate. All other communities that run educational institutions on leased land had availed the opportunity. But the TDB administration at that period did not respond,” he said.

“The TDB has not paid the lease amount for the revenue land given for Sasthamkotta DB College since 2000. We had issued numerous notices to the TDB, but they refused to pay the amount. The annual lease amount for the land is Rs 84 lakh and the arrears stood at Rs 18,85,20,968. They have to pay Rs 21 crore, including interest. As they did not respond to our notice we recommended revenue recovery. A few years ago we had offered them a one- time settlement of Rs 6 crore. But they did not respond,” said Kunnathoor tahsildar R K Sunil.

On July 21, the TDB had submitted an application at the Kunnathoor taluk office to waive off the lease arrears and allot the land to the board. The application was forwarded to the district collector. The revenue recovery procedure was initiated by Karunagappally tahsildar Shibu B as the accounts are maintained by Devaswom assistant commissioner at Karunagappally. “The revenue recovery procedure was initiated after getting sanction from the district collector. The account at Karunagappally branch of the bank was frozen months ago. As the TDB did not respond, the account at Kollam main branch of Dhanlaxmi bank was frozen on Tuesday,” he said.

TDB former president N Vasu said he had given representations to the chief minister and revenue minister seeking to allot the land last year. “The revenue recovery action initiated by the revenue department is unjustified. Revenue Minister K Rajan had assured me last year that the land will be allotted to TDB. I don’t know what happened after I left. The lease amount fixed by the department is exorbitant. The department has handed over the rights of the land to other aided educational institutions and a similar policy should be adopted in the case of DB College Sasthamkotta,” he said.

Hindu Aikya Vedi general secretary R V Babu said the action taken by the revenue department is discriminatory. “The government has handed over the leased land to educational institutions run by minorities communities. They have turned a blind eye towards violations by Knowledge City in Kozhikode. We hope the government will withdraw the revenue recovery proceedings,” he said.

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