On the 29th of January 2023, the Tamil Nadu Director General of Police filed a counter affidavit in the Supreme Court, responding to a petition which claimed that the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu had issued an oral order against granting permission to events surrounding Ram Lalla Pran Pratishtha. The Police DGP said that there had been a deliberate attempt to defame the Chief Minister and portray the government as ‘anti-Hindu’, which was patently false.
Interestingly, it is evident from the counter-affidavit filed by the Tamil Nadu police itself that before a court order passed by the Madras High Court in a separate petition, the Tamil Nadu administration had granted permission to only 4 of the 288 permissions applications they received.
In the short hearing on the 19th, the bench headed by Justice Sanjiv Khanna granted an additional 15 days for the state of Tamil Nadu to file a separate counter affidavit, apart from the one filed by Tamil Nadu police. However, it disallowed the petitioner to file a rejoinder to the counter-affidavit filed by the Tamil Nadu police. Justice Sanjiv Khanna reportedly said that the event (Pran Pratishtha) was already over so the petitioner should not “push it further”. The court, in this case, effectively denied the opportunity to the petitioner to present their side of the argument and point towards the duplicitous stand that is clearly being taken by the Tamil Nadu police.
The Tamil Nadu police in its counter affidavit said, “The Petitioner in this writ petition has narrated the facts of the case in about 12 paragraphs, of which he has utilised 9 paragraphs to defame the Hon’ble Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu and to criticise the actions of the Government. The contents in paragraphs number 1 to 8 are totally unwarranted and are derogatory against the Hon’ble Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu. The petitioner has portrayed the Tamil Nadu Government as an Anti-Hindu Government which is totally false and condemnable”. With the police displaying substantial bombast, one would imagine that the petition was wildly false and that the administration did indeed grant permission to events surrounding Ram Lalla Pran Pratishtha to all the Hindus. However, is that true?
To truly understand the politics that was played by the Tamil Nadu administration, it becomes imperative to break down the information provided by the Tamil Nadu police itself in its counter-affidavit to the court.
What the petition by Vinoj P Selvam said
The petition by Vinoj P Selvam said to be a BJP functionary from the state, had said that the Tamil Nadu government had taken a decision to disallow events surrounding the Ram Lalla Pran Pratishtha on the 22nd of January 2023. The petition claimed that Chief Minister M K Stalin had “orally instructed not to allow any ceremony or function” on January 22 — to celebrate the consecration of the Ram temple in Ayodhya.
Interestingly, as per a news report published by Tamil daily Dinamalar on 21st January, the DMK-led-Tamil Nadu government had given ‘unofficial verbal directive’ to temples against conducting special prayers and offering Annadanam (free food) on the occasion of Ram Mandir Pran Prathistha.
The report pointed out that the government has verbally warned temple administrators against organising special programmes on behalf of the devotees.
“No special puja, offering of Annadanam and any related programs should be held in Tamil Nadu temples on the occasion of the opening ceremony of Ayodhya Ram temple. No program should be held on behalf of the temple administration or in the name of devotees or in the name of organizations or parties. It should not be advertised. Action will be taken against the concerned temple executive if any activities including Annadanam are done in violation,“ the report emphasised.
The report further added that the Tamil Nadu police are actively working to prevent the live telecast of the Ram Mandir Pran Prathistha on big screens in public places in the State.
What the Tamil Nadu Police DGP claimed in his counter-affidavit
Since the Tamil Nadu police have claimed that the petitions against the state are baseless and that the permissions for events surrounding Pran Pratishtha were not denied, it becomes important to delve into the explanation provided by the police to substantiate their stand.
Apart from saying that the petition was meant to defame the Chief Minister and that the government of Tamil Nadu is not anti-Hindu, the police DGP said, “It is further submitted that the petitioner has approached this Hon’ble Court under an illusion and on false interpretation of reality. He has come with imaginary claims and has challenged a non-existent order. This Writ Petition has to be dismissed in limine because it is politically motivated and filed without any legal grounds”.
The DGP’s affidavit asserts there was no oral order by the Chief Minister to deny permission for Pran Pratishtha events, but the data provided by him leaves much to be desired as permissions for even indoor live streaming were denied before intervention by courts.
The police informed that they received 288 applications seeking permission for events on the date of the Ram temple Pran Pratishtha at Ayodhya. These applications pertained to requests for processions, bhajans, annadhanams, live streaming through LED screens in public places, and live streaming in and around private temples and temples under the HR &CE department.
The police goes on to admit that before the intervention of the court, the state of Tamil Nadu had only approved 4 of the 288 requests they had received.
Out of the 288 requests they received, the police themselves informed the court that they had granted permission for only 4, rejected 146 and kept 138 requests pending for verification.
Further, the police submits that it is only after the order of the Madras High Court and its Madurai Bench that they granted permission for the events.
Here is a table that the police affixed in their counter affidavit:
According to the Tamil Nadu Police’s affidavit, before the order by the Madras HC and the Madurai Bench, they had granted permission to only 4 requests. After the order by the court, granted permission to 248 requests (252 including the previous 4 granted).
The police petition says, “After the orders of the Hon’ble High Court of Madras and its Bench at Madurai, petitions those were rejected and kept pending for verification were reconsidered and petitioners were allowed to conduct the events”.
The Tamil Nadu Police elaborates that before the order of the High Court, they had granted 4 permissions. After the HC order, they ended up granting 248 additional permissions.
The police further says that out of the 288 permission requests received till the 20th of January, the local units rejected 146 events based on “the prevailing local issues and the proceedings were served accordingly quoting the same”.
It is, therefore, pertinent to ask what circumstances changed in 2 days that the police believed that these “prevailing local issues” were no longer a consideration and that permissions could be granted – this is a point we will analyse later in this report.
In fact, the petition of the police itself exposes how even permissions for events at private places were skirted by the police and cleared only after the High Court order.
Before the High Court order, the Tamil Nadu police granted permission to only 4 indoor events in public places. All requests for events at private places, indoors and outdoors, were either rejected or kept on hold. Right after the HC order, the Tamil Nadu police granted permission to most.
The police said that they got “requests for 31 events at private places and 257 events at public places. Out of which 138 petitions were at the verification stage due to late submission of the petition by the organisers. However, after the Hon’ble High Court verdict, all the proposals were reconsidered and regulated by the local police in a tie-up with the organisers and concerned departments. Finally, out of 31 private place events, 27 were allowed and out of 257 public place events, 225 were conducted”.
At this point, a pertinent question to be asked would be that while the Tamil Nadu police had kept various permissions on hold either because of late submission or the verification process, how did the backlog get magically cleared once the High Court order was passed and if they could indeed simply grant permission, why did they not do it before the High Court judgement itself? And since they did not, and it took an HC order to get them to let Hindus hold events on 22nd January, does it not bolster doubts cast by the petitioners that there may have been a deliberate plan to allow such events only sparingly in the state run by DMK, leaders of which wanted to eradicate Sanatan Dharma? It’s for the TN government to clarify.
What the High Court and Supreme Court had said, slamming the Tamil Nadu government
The Supreme Court had come down heavily on the police for their absurd arguments denying permission for Pran Pratishtha events. The Supreme Court had heard another petition on the same day as the Madras High Court.
The Supreme Court, while hearing the case, had directed the Tamil Nadu police and govt to act according to the law and stop arbitrarily refusing permissions.
Terming the reasons provided by the Tamil Nadu police “atrocious” for denying permission to a local temple to hold an event on the 22nd of January, the Supreme Court slammed the Tamil Nadu police.
Tamil Nadu had in its response essentially said that since Hindus are a minority in the Dindigul District, the temple could not be granted permission. The Supreme Court said that if this argument was to be accepted, then wherever Muslims are a minority, they would be able to hold prayer meetings or religious events. The reason given by the state was reportedly, “Here the Hindus are in the minority if they are permitted to hold this prior meeting, that will cause problems in the society”. The judge read this reason out and asked Tamil Nadu counsel, “is this a reason?”.
The Judge then told the state to regulate the events since they have the power, but providing this reason for denial of permission was “atrocious”.
The Supreme Court asked the Tamil Nadu government, who had denied that there was any oral order, to record the reasons for denial of any permission sought for processions, puja etc on the 22nd of January.
What had angered the Supreme Court in this case were statements of the DSP to an application by the administrators of the Sri Bhagavatiyamman Temple, seeking permission to hold Annadaman on the occasion of Ram Lalla Pran Pratishtha in Ayodhya. The DSP had denied the request saying, “The area of A Vellodu village, where you have requested permission to conduct the event, is predominantly inhabited by Christians. Additionally, there are areas with Christian temples. Due to the lower number of Hindu residents in this village, there is a possibility of encountering cultural sensitivities or legal complications related to public peace and morality when organizing events that are perceived as deviating from the prevailing religious practices”. It was further said, “Also, public peace is likely to be affected by the programme proposed to be conducted and law and order problems are likely to arise. Religious problems also are likely to arise public property is likely to be damaged, and the public is likely to be put to discomfort. Therefore, due to the above reasons, permission is denied for the program you want to conduct”.
The Supreme Court categorically said that if such reasons are given by the state to deny permission, “they will be in trouble”.
The Madras High Court on the other hand had to come down on the Tamil Nadu government as well.
In the response by the Tamil Nadu DGP, he refers to Writ Petition No. 1430 of 2024 and the order passed by the Madras HC, according to which, the Tamil Nadu administration had granted permissions.
OpIndia pulled out the order passed by the Madras HC in this case, which was in response to a petition by L Ganapathy. The petition was against the rejection of permission for Rama Nama Bhajan and Annadhanam on 22nd January at KKR Kalyana Mandapam, Pattabiram. The petition had also called to refrain officials from interfering in the rituals.
The public prosecutor claimed that the permission had already been granted and placed a copy of the proceedings of January 21 before it. The government then said that 1) There is no permission required for events in private enclosures like mandapams, private temples and any other private place, 2) If there is the possibility of spillover to public places, the organisers need to inform the police and seek permission 3) If such functions are planned to be conducted within temples, which are within the control of the HR & CE Department, the concerned official belonging to the Department must be informed about the same beforehand, and the permission will be granted subject to reasonable conditions imposed by the Department, and 4) Wherever considering the local situation, the police thinks that the area is sensitive, it will be left open to the police to impose such restrictions and to ensure that the function does not lead to any unnecessary law and order problem.
The Madras High Court accepted these submissions by the Government and disposed of the petition.
Another order cited by the police in their counter-affidavit was WP(MD) No.1383 of 2024. In this case, which came up in front of the Madurai Bench of the Madras HC, the petitioner was one V Subbiraj. The petition was against the denial of permission to “live Telecast, Broadcast or Recording of the Establishment and consecration of Lord Ramllalla Pran-Pratishtha Ceremony at Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Temple at Ayodhya through the medium of Television, to hold the flex boards, to use mike sets with permitted decibels to worship the God to be held on 22.01.2024 from 08.00 am., to 10.00 pm., at the place of the Desabandhu Ground, Virudhunagar”. This permission was denied on the 20th of January 2024 and the order in this case was passed on the 22nd of January 2024.
In this case, the single Judge bench cited the government’s submissions which were accepted by the court in the petition filed by L Ganapathy and directed the police to give adequate police protection for the Live Telecast of the event at the place of the Desapandhu Ground, Virudhunagar and allow the event to take place. It also said that if any untoward incident happened, the organisers would be held responsible.
The Temples under control of HR&CE and how the Tamil Nadu government tried to control events in those Temples
While the Tamil Nadu government and police want the courts and the people at large to believe that they are not anti-Hindu, their stand on events pertaining to Pran Pratishtha being held at Temples, especially the ones controlled by HR&CE raises several questions.
This is the table submitted by the Tamil Nadu police DGP in his counter affidavit.
Point Number 3 is of particular concern. The police say that before the High Court order, they had received 15 petitions for permissions for “live streaming in Temples and other indoors”. 7 of these were rejected and 8 were kept pending – this would mean that NONE of the permissions sought were granted by the administration. Given that in the High Court, the government admitted that for events at HR&CE-controlled temples, they were within their right to grant permission only within “reasonable restrictions”, one has to wonder how many of these permissions originally rejected by the TN administration were those temples which were under the control off HR&CE Department (state control).
If the administration actively rejected applications by those temples that were state-controlled before the High Court order, can it be said that the state was not trying to stop religious events on the day of the Pran Pratishtha of Ram Lalla in Ayodhya?
It was only after the High Court order that the Tamil Nadu administration promptly granted permission to all 15 applications. If the intention was not to stop the celebration of Ram Lalla Pran Pratishtha, why were these 15 permissions not granted before the Court was approached? The answer to this question has not been clear from any of the responses by the government or the police.
The attempt to eyewash by the Tamil Nadu government and administration
The counter-affidavit by the Tamil Nadu police DGP is rather revealing in itself. It claims that the Tamil Nadu government is not anti-Hindu because the administration granted permission to events on 22nd January AFTER the order by the High Court and the slap on the wrist they got from the Supreme Court, however, there is very little to explain why only 4 permissions were granted out of 288 before the courts got involved.
There is also very little to explain why they would stop permission for events that were to be held inside the Temple premises. Further, it is evident that several of the permissions were denied earlier simply because they did not want to offend other religious communities, thereby, stifling the religious rights of the Hindus in the process.
With such facts that have been revealed mostly by the Police itself and the orders by the Supreme Court, and High Courts, one has to wonder on what basis is one supposed to conclude that there was no active attempt by the government to ensure that the piety of the Hindus were denied an outlet.
The media on its part has, as usual, failed to highlight the duplicitous stand that the Tamil Nadu government and the administration have taken with respect to the Pran Pratishtha events and the manner in which they had denied permissions before the Courts got involved.
The headline by a supposed legal reporting platform gives the impression that the Tamil Nadu govt willingly granted permission to 252 out of 288 applications and therefore, all allegations thereof were unsubstantiated. This is clearly not the truth.
DT Next had a similar headline.
One cannot really be surprised by the chicanery of the Tamil Nadu administration, which has leaders who want to eradicate Sanatan Dharma and the complicity that the media has displayed in this case.
On 22nd January, Prime Minister Narendra Modi conducted the Pran Pratishtha of Shri Ram Lalla and inaugurated the Ram Mandir in a grand ceremony which saw about 7,000 guests attending and Deepavali-like celebrations across the country and the world over.
Exactly 18.75 lakh pilgrims have visited ever since. As per reports, daily visits have averaged over 2 lakh. It has been estimated that the holy city will see an annual footfall of about 5 crore pilgrims.
