CHENNAI: The Madras High Court has observed that the documents submitted by the HR&CE department prima facie demonstrated the sale of land belonging to Sabanayakar (Natarajar) temple in Chidambaram by the Podhu Dikshitars to third parties.
Referring to two land transactions, for which, the department submitted documents, the bench said the title does not belong to the individual Vembu Deekshithar who sold the property to the third party. In fact, the patta, in respect to these lands which stand in the name of Sabanayakar Temple also have been produced by the department, which “discloses the land belonging to the temple have been sold to third parties” under pretext of possessory right or will.
“Therefore, it is one of illustration whereby we can prima facie find out the temple land belonging to the Sabanayakar Temple has been sold by a member of Podhu Dikshitar,” a division bench of Justices R Suresh Kumar and S Sounthar said in a recent order.
The matter pertains to sale of the land belonging to the Sabanayakar Temple by the Dikshitars to the third party as alleged by the department. Recently, the special government pleader NRR Arun Natarajan submitted, in the court, certain documents to show sale of certain properties by Dikshitars.
Perusing the evidence, the bench observed that if not 1,000 or 2,000 acres of land was sold, at least, now about 20 acres of land (was sold), for which, this kind of transaction has been exposed by bringing documents. “It is open to the department to come out with such revelations,” the bench said, referring to the submission by Arun Natarajan that the department would be able to bring out more evidence after digging deeper into illegal or clandestine alienation of the temple land.