Lingaraj temple

Bhubaneswar, April 30: The Lingaraj temple administration has decided to spend Rs 10 lakh for construction of a boundary wall to protect its land from encroachment.

According to the plan, the temple administration will erect boundary walls around its properties at Santarapur and on Tankapani Road in the first phase, which will be followed by building boundary walls at other lands of the lord in the city.

The lands of Lingaraj, which was once sprawled over 2,000 acres, have now been reduced to a few hundred acres because of encroachment. Temple sources said that about 33 acres of the temple’s land had been encroached upon at prime locations in Bhubaneswar. The cost of the encroached lands stands at crores of rupees.

“Most of the lands of Lord Lingaraj have already been encroached upon. We plan to erect boundary walls around the plots. A fund of Rs 10 lakh will be allocated from this year’s budget for the purpose,” said chief executive officer of temple A.K. Pattnaik.

Sources said that around 300 cases had been pending in endowment court, and 200, in civil court. Similarly, the temple administration is fighting a number of cases in sub-collector, consolidation and settlement courts. The administration has to spend nearly Rs 1 lakh every year for the legal battles over its lands.

The state government, too, had constituted a committee in 2003 to retrieve lands from the encroachers. However, the temple administration has been able to retrieve small patches because of prolonged legal battles in various courts.

The temple administration is planning to provide insurance cover for the senior servitors of the temple. It will provide insurance to servitors of all nijogas, who have been offering service to the lord for long. Sources said a decision was likely to be taken in the coming budget meeting and once the proposal got a nod, the administration would ask for a list of servitors from all the nijogas.

Kasinath Pujapanda, president of the Pujapanda Sevayat Samiti, said they had been demanding for insurance for the servitors for long. “Such type of provision is already in place in the Jagannath temple in Puri. The servitors are vulnerable to accident during the Rukuna cart festival. They should be insured,” said Pujapanda.

However, some servitors are sceptical about this move as the temple has inadequate savings to insure its servitors. “Providing insurance to the servitors may hamper other works of the temple as it so far has a savings of Rs 3 crore, which is insufficient for the purpose,” said a senior servitor of the 11th century shrine.