Supreme Court to examine plea to abolish special treatment for VIPs in temples

Petitioners say discrimination on the basis of wealth amounts to violation of rights

The Supreme Court on Friday (October 25, 2024) agreed to examine a plea to scrap the levy of ‘VIP entry charges’ and according of “preferential, selective and special treatment” to a certain class of people in temples while thousands of devotees, including senior citizens, women, children and persons with disabilities, waited for hours in queues for darshan.

A Bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna and Sanjay Kumar decided to list the petition filed by Vijay Kishor Goswami and said the term ‘VIP’ or ‘Very Important Person’ was not defined in law. Usually, those who could afford to pay exorbitant amounts got to sail through while others unable to pay suffered long hours of deprivation to exercise their right to worship. The petition termed it “VIP culture”.

Mr. Goswami, represented by advocates Sarthak Ghonkrokta and Akash Vashishtha, said the arbitrary practice and discrimination solely on the basis of how deep a person’s pocket was amounted to the violation of the fundamental rights to equality, dignity and right to freely practise religion.

The petition said people of all castes, communities, classes and sections of society should be treated equally and provided a fair and an equal opportunity to pray and get darshan in all temples, religious structures and public places of sanctity.

The Union government, through the Ministries of Culture and Tourism and various States including Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Haryana, Assam and Jharkhand have been arraigned as respondents in the petition.

The petition said that with the growth of religious tourism and construction of new temples such as the Ram Temple in Ayodhya and expansion of several others, many Durga Shaktipeeths and Jyotirlingas (Shiva temples) may “imitate” these VIP charge/VIP entry practises.

The plea has also sought the constitution of a national-level board with a “multi-tier structural and functional framework for the redressal of complaints, grievances, issues and concerns of citizens related to the functioning and practices of temples and/or other religious structures or public places of sanctity, across the country”.

It has also sought the framing of Standard Operating Procedures to regulate and manage the entry of devotees and visitors in temples, religious structures or public places of sanctity.

Published - October 25, 2024 02:59 pm IST