Temple demolition thwarted

G Vinod | August 9, 2011

FT deputy minister Saravanan buys time for Sri Maha Kaliamman temple committee to relocate to a new site gazetted for the temple

PETALING JAYA: The scheduled demolition of a Hindu temple in Jalan Temengung, off Jalan Cochrane today was postponed after Federal Territories and Urban Well-Being deputy minister M Saravanan intervened.

The Sri Maha Kaliamman temple committee, which has been ignoring DBKL’s eviction notices the past six months, has now been given two weeks to move to a new site alloted for the temple.

The Federal Territories Land and Mines Office had alloted a land in Jalan Nakhoda Yusuf 1 for the relocation of the temple, currently squatting on government land.

About 100 Kuala Lumpur City Hall (DBKL) officers and police officers arrived at the scene with heavy machinery at 9.30am today to demolish the temple.

However, about 300 people, consisting of several non-governmental organisations (NGO) and concerned citizens gathered at the site to protest against the scheduled demolition.

Saravanan arrived about 10 minutes later and instructed the officers to postpone their work.

When contacted, Saravanan said the government had given due consideration to the matter despite the temple squatting on government land since the 1960s.

“And the government has been kind enough to allocate a new site for them, which is about 600 metres away from its present location. The new site has been gazetted for the temple.

“Plus, an allocation of RM200,000 has also been set aside to rebuild the temple with three houses built for the priests to live,” said Saravanan.

‘Orchestrating a charade’

On why the temple committee refused to budge from the place, Saravanan said he was unsure.

“Some people are just trying to politicise the matter,” he said, adding that the present location had been earmarked for commercial development and the MRT project.

Temple committee member A Ramachandran said they refused to budge from the present location because the site itself is sacred ground and temple was built around a tree in 1967.

“How are we to move the tree? Besides, there is also a sacred snake pit here which we cannot relocate,” said Ramachandran.

Indian Transformation and Rights Action Front (Intraf) executive secretary S Gobikrishnan said the government could easily allow the temple to remain as it sits on a land which is less that half an acre in size.

“You can do your development project around the area without touching the temple,” said Gobikrishnan.

He also took a swipe at Saravanan, accusing him of orchestrating a political charade over the matter.

“He could have just called the DBKL officers earlier to halt the demolition. He wasted much of DBKL and the police’s resources today,” said Gobikrishnan.

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