Chilkur priest takes up archaka issues with Telangana Deputy CM Bhatti

HYDERABAD : Temples Protection Movement convenor and chief priest of Chilkur Balaji temple CS Rangarajan met Deputy Chief Minister Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka on Thursday to discuss the pending issues of traditional archakas of ancient temples in Bhadradri, Vemulawada and Basara, among others.

Rangarajan highlighted that the Supreme Court had responded positively to the 1996 writ petition of Dr MV Soundararajan, stating that traditional and rural temples would close if the government insisted on stopping the rituals of hereditary archakas.

Pointing out that the YS Rajasekhara Reddy-led government in undivided Andhra Pradesh reinstated their services in 2007 through legislation, Rangarajan said the amended legislation has not been implemented in Telangana even after 16 years.

In Andhra Pradesh, the government had issued GO Ms 439 in 2019 and initiated succession proceedings for the families of thousands of archakas, he added.

Stating that hereditary archakas cannot be transferred as per the 2007 amended legislation, the chief priest termed the recent move of endowments officials to transfer the archakas as wrong.

Rangarajan said that countless representations to the past chief minister, endowments minister and officials in the years after bifurcation have not yielded any results. The government has been misled by a few officials that implementation of revised pay scales is the solution to all problems faced by the archakas, he added.