Source: https://indconlawphil.wordpress.com/tag/secularism/
Timestamp: 2019-04-20 03:24:26+00:00

Document:
The Dawoodi Bohra case, which we discussed in the last essay, has been taken off the supplementary list for tomorrow. Hopefully, it will not take eleven years for it to be listed a second time!
The basic idea, again, is that the while the basic, normative unit of Part III is the individual, the protection of group rights under Articles 26, 29 and 30 of the Constitution acknowledges the fact that individuals are embedded in culture, and culture is what mediates effective exercise of human freedom. However, just as that basic idea requires the Constitution to guarantee group rights, it simultaneously limits the extent to which those rights can be invoked. In Kymlicka’s phrase, a culture cannot invoke special rights against its own members, insofar as such rights become a tool for curtailing, rather than enhancing, individual freedom. The philosophical mistake that the majority made in the Dawoodi Bohra Case was to treat group rights under Article 26(b) as ends in themselves (and hence, the repeated fears about the need to maintain group purity and discipline through the power of miscommunication), and not as instruments towards achieving individual freedom. In fact, a reading of the sort that Kymlicka advances (and which would require the Court to have upheld the Bombay Act), is more consistent with both the liberal strand of Part III (as embodied in classic civil rights against the State – Articles 14, 19, 21, 25), as well as its social-democratic strand, which is concerned with protecting individuals from the tyranny of their own communities (Articles 15(2), 17, 23, 25(2)).
On Monday, the 11th of January, a Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court will begin hearing the case of Central Board of the Dawoodi Bohra Committee v State of Maharashtra. This is a case that could potentially have important ramifications for religious freedom under the Constitution, and the interpretation of Articles 25 and 26. In this post, I will attempt to provide a short primer to the background of the case, and the events leading up to Monday’s hearing.
The genesis of Monday’s hearing lies in a Constitution Bench order passed in December 2004 (eleven years ago!), directing the setting up of another Constitution Bench to consider the correctness of the Supreme Court’s 1962 decision in Sardar Syedna Taher Saifuddin v State of Bombay. In that case (yet another) Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court had struck down the Bombay Prevention of Excommunication Act of 1949, on the ground that it violated Articles 25 and 26 of the Constitution. Twenty-five years after the decision in Sardar Syedna [hereafter “the Dawoodi Bohra Case”], in 1986, a writ petition was filed asking the Court to review and overrule its decision. Eight years after the filing, in 1994, a two-judge bench directed the matter to be heard by a seven-judge bench. A seven judge bench was constituted that same year, but it adjourned the case. There was some controversy over whether the matter could be referred directly to a seven-judge bench. In its 2004 order, the Supreme Court observed that only a bench of ‘equal strength’ could question the correctness of a prior judgment; consequently, it was not open to a bench of two judges to directly refer the matter to a seven-judge bench. After a length discussion on the need for judicial propriety and discipline, the Court held that the matter be placed before a five-judge bench. Only if that bench doubted the correctness of the Dawoodi Bohra Case, could there be a further referral to seven judges, to finally hear and decide the issue.
The key question on Monday, therefore, will be whether the Petitioners can convince the Constitution Bench that there exists sufficient reason to doubt the Dawoodi Bohra decision, and to refer the matter to seven judges. To understand the stakes, therefore, we need to closely examine the Dawoodi Bohra decision.
The Dawoodi Bohra Case involved a challenge to the constitutionality of the Bombay Prevention of Excommunication Act of 1949. The preamble to the Act stated that its objective was to put a stop to the practice of excommunication, that was prevailing in certain communities, since its effect was to deprive members of their ‘legitimate rights and privileges.‘ To this effect, Section 2 of the Act defined excommunication as ‘the expulsion of a person from any community of which he is member depriving him of rights and privileges which are legally enforceable by a suit of civil nature…’, despite the fact that the determination of such right/privilege might also involve the Court having to rule on questions pertaining to purely religious rites or practices. Section 3 of the Act invalidated any excommunication, and provided for penal sanctions for the same.
The Petitioner was the “dai”, or head priest of the Dawoodi Bohra community, an offshoot of Shia Islam. As the Court noted, “as Dai-ul-Mutlaq and the vicegerent of Imam on Earth in seclusion, the Dai has not only civil powers as head of the sect and as trustee of the property, but also ecclesiastical powers as religious leader of the community.” The Petitioner further argued that one of his powers, as Dai, was the power of excommunicating recalcitrant members from the community, the result of which was ‘exclusion from the exercise of religious rights in places under the trusteeship of the Dai-ul-Mustlaq.’ By taking away this power, the Bombay Act violated the Petitioner’s right to religious freedom under Article 25 of the Constitution, as well as the Article 26(b) rights of the Dawoodi Bohra community, as a religious denomination, to regulate its own religious affairs and preserve the community by enforcing discipline.
At its core, therefore, the Dawoodi Bohra Case was about the limits of State intervention into the affairs of a religious community – intervention that, it must be noted, was aimed at recalibrating the balance of power between its members in a more equitable direction. Apart from raising important questions of constitutional law, the case also presents a fascinating philosophical problem: to what extent can a liberal democracy, which respects the rights of cultural communities to exist and propagate, impose democratic or liberal norms upon a community’s internal functioning?
Das Gupta J. then examined the place of excommunication in several religious systems, quoting Professor Hazeltine’s opinion that the purpose of excommunication is “maintaining discipline within religious organizations and hence of preserving and strengthening their solidarity.” Accordingly, he observed that “excommunication cannot but be held to be for the purpose of maintaining the strength of the religion. It necessarily follows that the exercise of this power of excommunication on religious grounds forms part of the management by the community, through its religious head, “of its own affairs in matters of religion.” Consequently, Article 26(b) was violated by the Act. That the effect of excommunication was to deprive a person of his civil rights was, according to the Court, irrelevant, since Article 26(b) did not carve out an exception for civil rights.
The next question was whether, despite violating Article 26(b), the Act could still be saved by Article 25(2), which allowed the State, inter alia, to make laws for social welfare and reform. Without providing any further reasons, however, the Court simply noted that “the mere fact that certain civil rights which might be lost by members of the Dawoodi Bohra community as a result of excommunication even though made on religious grounds and that the Act prevents such loss, does not offer sufficient basis for a conclusion that it is a law “providing for social welfare and reform.” Consequently, the Court held that the law violated Article 26(b), was not saved by Article 25(2), and was accordingly unconstitutional.
In his concurring opinion, Justice Ayyangar observed that the purpose of excommunication was to ensure the preservation of “the identity of a religious denomination… [which] consists in the identity of its doctrines, creeds and tenets and these are intended to ensure the unity of the faith which its adherents profess and the identity of the religious views are the bonds of the union which binds them together as one community.” He then noted that “the right to such continued existence involves the right to maintain discipline by taking suitable action inter alia of excommunicating those who deny the fundamental bases of the religion.” Consequently, it was clear that excommunication was a question of religion, and even if the aim of the Bombay Act was to protect civil rights, by outlawing excommunication altogether, it was interfering with the community’s Article 26(b) right to religion.
On the question of Article 25(2), Justice Ayyangar held that laws for social reform were saved only insofar as they did not “invade the basic and essential practices of religion”, because “by the phrase “laws providing for social welfare and reform” it was not intended to enable the legislature to “reform”, a religion out of existence or identity.” And since “faith in [the Dai’s] spiritual mission and in the efficacy of his ministration is one of the bonds that hold the community together as a unit”, the power of excommunication was clearly an integral part of the religion. Consequently, the Act could not be saved by Article 25(2).
Running through both opinions are the following strains of thought: first, excommunication is essential to maintaining the ‘identity’ or ‘purity’ of religion, by purging it of dissidents – and consequently, it is a matter of religion protected by Article 26(b); secondly, the fact that excommunication deprives an individual of core civil rights is legally irrelevant; and thirdly, the law is not saved by virtue of providing for social reform, because that is not its scope (Majority), and even it it is, the State is not permitted to ‘reform a religion out of existence’ (Ayyangar J.).
After considering precedent on the point, Justice Sinha then framed the question thus: Article 26 guaranteed religious denominations the right to manage their own affairs in matters of religion. However, “activities associated with religious practices may have many ramifications and varieties-economic, financial, political and other-as recognised by Art. 25(2)(a). ” These covered a much wider field than that covered by Article 25(1) or 26(b). Therefore, the Court had to “draw a line of demarcation between practices consisting of rites and ceremonies connected with the particular kind of worship, which is the tenet of the religious community, and practices in other matters which may touch the religious institutions at several points, but which are not intimately concerned with rites and ceremonies the performance of which is an essential part of the religion.” Only the former would be protected by Article 26(b). Now, in the case of excommunication, as Justice Sinha observed, the “expelled person is excluded from the exercise of rights in connection not only with places of worship but also from burying the dead in the community burial ground and other rights to property belonging to the community, which are all disputes of a civil nature and are not purely religious matters.” Consequently, it was clear that excommunication belonged to the category of acts that might “tough the religious institution“, but were not essentially religious.
A. The Majority provides no reason to hold that the Act is not saved by virtue of being a measure of social reform. By contrast, in his dissenting opinion, Justice Sinha places the Act in the tradition of laws outlawing Sati, removing caste disabilities, allowing widow remarriage, and so on. Since the Majority has no answer on point, at least this question deserves a full (re)hearing.
Ambedkar’s central concern, therefore, was to ensure that in a country like India, where the influence of religion was far more pervasive than in the West, the State’s power to pass reformative legislation should not be hamstrung by giving religion an expansive interpretation. Consequently, he distinguished between questions that are “essentially religious”, and questions that are connected with religion, but deal with other aspects of a person’s life. By a judicial sleight of hand, the distinction has now been converted into one between “essential religious practices” and inessential ones, instead of practices that are “essentially religious”, and those which are incidentally so. And indeed, Ambedkar’s examples of tenancy and succession seem to speak directly to Justice Sinha’s reasoning that, insofar, an ostensible religious act ends up curtailing an individual’s civil rights, it loses constitutional protection.
C. Justice Sinha’s dissent is more in tune with the Indian constitutional secularism. In a detailed study of the Court’s religious freedom jurisprudence, Gary Jacobsohn has argued that it is best characterised as (in his words) “ameliorative secularism”. Ameliorative secularism – as opposed to the “wall of separation” view in the United States – is embodied by an approach to religion that allows the State (or the Court, as the case may be) to intervene in religious practices with the goal of ensuring individual autonomy and freedom. There is a deeper argument of liberal philosophy here: Liberalism is based on the priority of individual freedom; however, it is well understood by now that for human beings, individual freedom and self-fulfilment are often dependent upon participation in, and identification with, affiliative groups (including religious groups). The reason why a liberal Constitution also provides for group rights, therefore, is not because groups are valuable in themselves, but because they are central to a complete and fulfilling life. Consequently, insofar as groups fail to provide the basic conditions of individual autonomy (for instance, by wilfully suppressing women, or by forcing people to conform to the dominant ideology on pain of excommunication), to that extent, the State can intervene through reformatory measures. This idea of ‘ameliorative secularism’ is present in a number of Supreme Court judgments, and most vividly in Gajendragadkar CJI’s opinion in Sastri Yagnapurushadji.
D. Justice Sinha’s dissenting opinion is more in line with the transformative spirit of the Constitution, that recognises that horizontal asymmetries of power are as dangerous and pernicious towards individual freedom as State oppression. Indian civil rights movements leading up to the framing of the Constitution were focused equally on freedom from alien political dominance, as well as freedom from oppressive private power. This is reflected in Ambedkar’s Mahar satyagrahas for temple entry and for the right to draw water from the community well. The Indian Constitution as well, through a number of provisions, recognises this (Articles 15(2), 17, 23 and 25(2)(b), to name four).
I hope to be able to develop these arguments more fully, either as a critique of the Court’s decision, should it choose against referral, or as reasons why a potential seven judge bench should overrule the Dawoodi Bohra Case.
Guest Post – III: Secularism and the Freedom of Religion Reconsidered – Old Wine in New Bottles?
Throughout its history, the Supreme Court of India has generally viewed governmental intervention in matters of religion as a vital component in the state’s movement to initiate social welfare and reform. The court has, over the years, carved a particular jurisprudence that allows it to determine what constitutes an “essential religious practice;” and, in so doing, the court has provided itself a legal basis to condone pervasive state intervention in matters of both religious belief and religious practice. Indeed, as Marc Galanter once observed, even in a secular state, “civil authorities, including the courts, find themselves faced with the necessity of ascertaining what is religious.” And, in India, this necessity is particularly stark given that the state’s powers to bring forth social reforms in Hindu religious institutions is constitutionally accorded.
Nonetheless, given that discrimination in religious institutions is often so deep-rooted as to deny individuals’ their most basic civil liberties, and given that the Constitution enjoins the state to promote social welfare in these institutions, India’s secularism, if indeed we must call it that, is certainly quite distinct from the various western models of the concept (it could be described, for instance, as Rajeev Bhargava does, as a form of contextual secularism). This means the court is often tasked with the onerous job of striking a delicate balance between practices or beliefs, which individuals or groups might view as being freely exercisable, and the power of the state to intervene in the management and administration of religious institutions.
Yet, every time the Supreme Court has embarked on this mission to determine what constitutes “an essential religious function,” it appears to be making a moral judgment. As Dhawan and Nariman wrote, “With a power greater than that of a high priest, maulvi or dharmashastri, judges have virtually assumed the theological authority to determine which tenets of a faith are ‘essential’ to any faith and emphatically underscored their constitutional power to strike down those essential tenets of a faith that conflict with the dispensation of the Constitution. Few religious pontiffs possess this kind of power and authority.” Apart from arrogating unto itself this power to determine what constitutes an essential religious practice, the Supreme Court has further muddled the interpretive process by bringing forth a facile distinction between “denominational” temples and public temples. While the former category, which, according to the court, includes a few closely-knit Hindu religious institutions, enjoys a greater element of liberty in managing its own affairs, the latter category has been seen as capable of being completely brought within the state’s officious powers. It might, for instance, indeed be true that the restriction applied in Hindu religious institutions, which sees qualifications for priesthood restricted on the basis of the Agamas, as a practice antithetical to decent morality. But, the question remains: must not the state leave religion alone? Even in public religious institutions, is it not for the community of followers to determine for themselves what constitutes an essential religious practice?
To resolve this question – i.e., the conflict between the right to religious freedom and the state’s duty in intervening to bring forth social welfare and reform in matters of religion – we must start with the constitutional text. Let us see what Articles 25 and 26 expressly provide.
But here’s the paradox. In spite of holding thus, the Supreme Court nonetheless in Shirur Mutt upheld vast portions of the Madras Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments Act, 1951, under which a commissioner could frame and settle a ‘scheme’ if he or she had reason to believe that a religious institution was mismanaging the resources placed under its care or was being run contrary to the purposes for which it was founded. The result therefore helped herald several new laws through which states sought to arrogate the power to control Hindu religious institutions. What’s more, with time, the doctrine of essential religious practice, as was originally framed in Shirur Mutt, also began to wither, and took on a whole new meaning.
In Sri Venkatramana Devaru v. State of Mysore, for instance, the court was asked to determine whether the Madras Temple Entry Authorization Act, which was enacted with a view to granting Harijans a right to enter all public temples, applied to a temple founded by a sect called the Gowda Saraswath Brahmins. The court held that the sect was indeed a separate religious denomination that enjoyed the right to manage its own affairs under Article 26, but it also found that this right was subject to laws protected by Article 25(2)(b). To hold otherwise, wrote Justice Venkatarama Aiyar for the court, would render Article 25(2)(b) wholly nugatory in its application to denominational temples, even though the language of the clause includes such institutions. The court was forced into trying to harmonize Articles 26 and 25(2)(b) because it had found that the practice of excluding certain persons from entering into a temple for worship was a matter of religion according to Hindu Ceremonial Law. Thus, in Devaru, Justice Aiyar found, quite contrary to the judgment in Shirur Mutt, that it was for the court to determine what practices were essential according to the tenets of a religion.
In the decades that followed Devaru, as Ronojoy Sen points out in his excellent book, “Articles of Faith: Religion, Secularism, and the Indian Supreme Court,” the essential practices doctrine entrenched itself as the test to determine different varieties of cases. It has been employed not only in deciding which practices deserve constitutional protection, but also in adjudicating the validity of legislation aimed at usurping the administrative and managerial authority of religious institutions. The consequences of the doctrine have been stark. It has allowed the Supreme Court to define for us what our religious beliefs and practices ought to encompass. In fact, Justice K. Ramaswamy went so far as to differentiate, in AS Narayana Deekshitulu v. State of Andhra Pradesh, AIR 1996 SC 1765, between what he termed as secularisation and secularism.
“Secularisation,” wrote Ramaswamy J., “essentially is a process of decline in religious activity, belief, ways of thinking and in restructuring the institution. Though secularism is a political ideology and strictly may not accept any religion as the basis of State action or as the criteria of dealing with citizens, the Constitution of India seeks to synthesise religion, religious practice or matters of religion and secularism. In secularising the matters of religion which are not essentially and integrally parts of religion, secularism, therefore, consciously denounces all forms of super-naturalism or superstitious beliefs or actions and acts which are not essentially or integrally matters of religion or religious belief or faith or religious practices. In other words, non-religious or anti-religious practices are anti-thesis to secularism which seeks to contribute in some degree to the process of secularisation of the matters of religion or religious practices.” Having held thus, Justice Ramaswamy delved into a deep discussion of various Hindu religious texts to determine for the followers of the faith what they ought to regard as essentially religious. The result has been the withering of the autonomy of both the individual and the group to enjoy a freedom of conscience. The questions that the court poses no longer relate simply to whether a specific measure is required in the interests of fulfilling the community exceptions of public order, morality, or health. Rather, they involve a purported analysis of inherently religious tenets, which the court is certainly not qualified to rule conclusively upon.
In his final book, “Religion without God,” Ronald Dworkin wrote that when governmental intervention “cannot be justified as protecting the rights of others, but only reflects disapproval of the religion that imposes the duty in question, government has violated the right to free exercise.” The Supreme Court of India has repeatedly committed such errors. In aiming to rationalize religion, the court routinely disapproves of different religious practices, holding such practices to be inessential to the practice of the religion. In the case of the archakas appointments, it could be plausibly argued that state intervention is required to correct a historic social evil. But we must nonetheless ask ourselves whether it is within the state’s domain to intervene in matters of ethical choice. The Supreme Court was possibly quite correct in ruling in the ERJ Swami case, which we discussed earlier, that a deviation from the Agamas would violate one’s freedom of conscience. But the manner in which it arrived at its decision—which involved an engagement with complicated religious tenets—remains dubious.
When the court sits over judgment of the Tamil Nadu ordinance of 2006, therefore, it must look to set right several doctrinal errors of the past. It must test the law purely on whether it is required in the interests of morality, public order, or health, and, if not, whether the law is required to promote social welfare and reform. While it is one thing to argue that the prevention of entry into temples of some communities helps propagate a deeply corrosive form of discrimination, it is another to argue that the state must also regulate how temples select their priests. It isn’t for the courts to reformulate religion in the manner that it feels most rational.
Guest Post – II: Secularism and Freedom of Religion Reconsidered – Old Wine in New Bottles?
This amendment to Section 55 was challenged in the Supreme Court by way of 12 separate writ petitions filed by hereditary Archakas and Mathadipatis of some of the most ancient and historic Hindu public temples in Tamil Nadu. The petitioners’ contended in ERJ Swami v. The State of Tamil Nadu that Articles 25 and 26 of the Constitution of India protected their freedom of hereditary succession to the office of the Archaka, and this freedom was an essential and integral part of the faith of the Saivite and Vaishnavite worshippers.
The court through Justice DG Palekar’s judgment dismissed the writ petitions. It held that the power to appoint archakas to public temples was a secular function (remember, the Constitution explicitly allows the state to regulate such non-religious functions) and to the extent that the trustees of the temples were no longer bound to make appointments on the sole ground of hereditary succession the amendments were valid. But, the court also held, that the amendment did not provide any power to the trustees to eschew the Agamas, which constitute the fundamental treatise on rituals in Hindu temples, in determining who could be appointed as a priest.
To sum up, the Supreme Court in ERJ Swami’s case upheld the 1970 Amendment, by holding that the function of appointing an Archaka was secular in nature, and that therefore a trustee of a temple was not bound to appoint priests on the basis of hereditary succession. The court nonetheless rendered nugatory the fundamental purpose of the amendment by also holding that the trustee was nonetheless obligated to follow the Agamas in arriving at a decision. And the Agamas provide that only members of particular “denominations” are competent to preside as priests. As a result of this judgment, every time an appointment is made to the position of an Archaka in a public temple, notifications seeking applications often seek to reinforce the fulfilment of specific conditions of caste as a criterion for appointment.
In 2006, however, the government of Tamil Nadu sought to further change this practice. It introduced an ordinance, which declared that “suitably trained and qualified Hindus, without discrimination of caste, creed, custom or usage” could be appointed as priests to the 36,000-odd temples under government administration across the state. The ordinance was immediately challenged in the Supreme Court, and has been stayed pending a final decision. The primary argument of the petitioners is that the new law violates the specific finding of the Supreme Court in ERJ Swami’s case, that it seeks to permit the state to act contrary to the Agamas, even though the fulfilment of these conditions has been held to be integral to the practice of the religion.
Guest Post – I: Secularism and the Freedom of Religion Reconsidered – Old Wine in New Bottles?
(In this three-part series, Suhrith Parthasarthy, a Chennai-based lawyer and journalist, re-examines the issue of secularism and the freedom of religion in India, in light of an important, ongoing litigation at the Supreme Court).
The right of individuals and groups to practice their own religious belief has long been recognized as an integral value of liberal democracies. Intervention by the State in matters of religion is therefore often seen as anathema. Laws which impinge the observance of any religious belief or practice, or which discriminate between religions, are generally viewed as violating this right to a freedom of conscience. Like most other liberties, however, this right too is subject to certain restrictions, the “community exception,” as Tom Bingham, the late British judge and jurist described it.
In India, the right to religious freedom and its boundaries (which also peculiarly includes a few specific mandates to the state) is contained in Articles 25 and 26 of the Constitution. The former guarantees the people a freedom of conscience and the right freely to profess, practise, and propagate religion, subject to public order, morality, and health, and to the guarantee of other fundamental rights. It also protects laws made by the state to regulate any economic, financial, political, or other secular activity associated with religious practice, and laws that provide for social welfare and reform, including the throwing open of Hindu religious institutions of public character to all classes and sections of Hindus. Article 26 provides (once again subject to public order, morality, and health) a right to every religious denomination to establish and maintain institutions for religious and charitable purposes; to manage its own affairs in matters of religion; to own and acquire movable and immovable property; and to administer such property in accordance with law.
Recently, however, the Supreme Court has shown an inclination towards rethinking its jurisprudence. In January 2014, in the case of Subramanian Swamy v. The State of Tamil Nadu, the court quashed an order passed by the government of Tamil Nadu, which sought to bring within the state government’s control the management of the Sri Sabhanayagar Temple in the town of Chidambaram. Specifically, a bench of Justices BS Chauhan and SA Bobde found that the order appointing an Executive Officer to the Temple under Section 45 of the Tamil Nadu Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments Act, 1959, was in violation of the rights guaranteed under Article 26 of the Constitution of India to the Podu Dikshitars, a small sect of Smartha Brahmins.
The court arrived at its decision on the basis of a 1951 ruling of the Madras High Court, which, in its opinion, operated as a judgment in rem, i.e. that the judgment was binding on everyone, and had an effect beyond just the rights of the parties concerned. In Sri Lakshmindra Theertha Swamiar of Sri Shirur Mutt v. The Commissioner, Hindu Religious Endowments, Madras, the Madras High Court had found several provisions of the Madras Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments Act, 1951 unconstitutional insofar as the law was made applicable to the Matathipathi of the Shirur Mutt in the South Kanara District and to the Dikshitars of the Sabhanayagar Temple. Subsequently, the decision rendered in favour of the Shirur Mutt was substantially reversed by a five-judge bench of the Supreme Court in what is today known as “The Shirur Mutt case”. But the state government chose to accept the high court’s ruling insofar as it applied to the Dikshitars of the Sabhanayagar Temple, while appealing the verdict insofar as it applied to the Shirur Mutt. In other words, the government had conceded that the Dikshitars represented a separate “religious denomination” enjoying special rights. Therefore, according to Justices Chauhan and Bobde, to today re-examine the question of whether the Dikshitars were a religious denomination that enjoyed these special rights under Article 26 was barred as it had already been conclusively judged.
On these technical principles, to lawyers in particular, the Supreme Court’s decision in the Subramanian Swamy case might even appear unexceptional. But the bench also made a series of telling remarks that possibly went beyond the gamut of the proceedings. It held, for instance, that any takeover by the state of a temple’s management ought to be limited in duration. “Even if the management of a temple is taken over to remedy [an] evil,” wrote Chauhan, J., “the management must be handed over to the person concerned immediately after the evil stands remedied. Continuation thereafter would tantamount to usurpation of their proprietary rights or violation of the fundamental rights guaranteed by the Constitution in favour of the persons deprived.” This view of the Supreme Court, which effectively calls for stronger limits on state intervention in matters of religious administration, goes against the general grain of the court’s previously established jurisprudence. More crucially, it also gives us a hint of how the Supreme Court might rule on a string of litigation concerning Tamil Nadu’s temples pending for final hearing on the court’s docket. One such case involves the appointment of archakas—or priests—in the state’s temples.

References: Art. 25
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v.