Karur Temple Land Row: Hindu Munnani Demands HC Judge-Led Panel Against TVK Govt Order

A government order lifting a decades-old registration ban on more than 3,084 acres of land linked to four temples in Karur district has snowballed into a political controversy for the TVK government, with the Hindu Munnani outfit on July 14 demanding an independent inquiry.

The Tamil Nadu Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments (HR&CE) Department had, in a July 9 communication, directed officials in Tiruppur to remove 471 survey numbers covering the land — tied to the Pugazhimalai Balasubramania Swamy, Karur Kalyana Pasupatheeswarar, Mariamman and Magudeswarar temples — from the state's "Prohibitory Module," a list that bars registration of disputed or protected land.

Temple activist T. R. Ramesh and the BJP's Tamil Nadu unit, led by state president Nainar Nagendran, accused the TVK government of paving the way to hand land worth an estimated ₹25,000 crore to encroachers, with Ramesh calling it "an act of treachery" that even the DMK had not attempted.

The state government maintained that the order only lifted the registration freeze and did not grant fresh pattas or transfer ownership, arguing the land had been legally assigned to private individuals more than six decades ago under the Tamil Nadu Minor Inams Abolition Act. Former BJP state president K. Annamalai broke ranks with his own party to back this reading of the law, saying long-time patta holders should not be branded encroachers.

On July 14, Hindu Munnani state president Kadeswara Subramaniam asked the government to put the order on hold and constitute a panel led by a sitting Madras High Court judge to examine the matter, saying the decision had "shocked and created confusion" among devotees.