The Hindu Religious Institutions and Charitable Endowments Act Amendment Bill 2024

 

The Hindu Religious Institutions and Charitable Endowments Act Amendment Bill 2024 

This is another attack on the sleeping Sanatan, not new, not the first and not the last. If Hindus do not wake up, this will go on till India becomes an Islamic Nation.

On 21 February 2024, the Congress government of Karnataka passed the Hindu Religious Institutions and Charitable Endowments Act Amendment Bill 2024 in the Assembly and would implement the amended law. According to this, a tax of 5% has been imposed on all such temples in the state whose annual gross amount of offerings in the donation box is between Rs 10 lakh and Rs 1 crore. Temples whose gross offerings exceed Rs 1 crore annually, a tax of 10% has been imposed. These are all temples, which are more than 35,000, in addition to temples under government control. This amount of tax will be put in the Common Pool Fund which will be used for needy religious institutions. The two sections added to the Act are extremely dangerous which can be nothing but an attempt to destroy Sanatan Dharma and ancient Indian Sanatan culture.

According to Section 19 (A) of this amended Act, the money collected in the common pool can be used for any needy religious institution. That is, the amount collected will also be used on Islamic and Christian institutions. Even now, the money received from the temples is given to Muslim and Christian institutions, which is being widely opposed and many petitions are also pending in the courts in this regard, so the law was enacted. According to Section 25 of the Act, members from both Hindu and other religions can be appointed to the Managing Committee in case of composite entities. This means that the government wants non-Hindus to appoint as members and office bearers in the managing committees of temples under its control and in the managing committees that run other temples. Such a system has been implemented in Andhra Pradesh, Kerala and Tamil Nadu and the Congress government of Karnataka is desperate to annihilate Hindu temples and Sanatan culture in Karnataka like these states.

Some Hindu organizations and Sant Samaj of the state criticized it and called it a jizya tax, but since the Hindu and Sanatan society is sleeping deeply, there was no vocal opposition from anywhere outside Karnataka, in the rest of India, there was no response from any Hindu organisation or saint community, not even from the Shankaracharyas who made unnecessary comments on the Ram temple consecration ceremony. Nothing can be expected from political parties engaged in Muslim appeasement because they have also become supporters of Ghazwa-e-Hind in the equation of power. These political parties, blinded by selfishness, are not hesitating to sacrifice the nation. The BJP is not far behind in the game of Muslim appeasement. An analysis of the last 10 years of BJP rule at the Centre shows that no government in independent India has done more for Muslims economically than the Modi government. Yet the BJP is still untouchable for Muslims. So she tries to go around and stand up with the Hindus, but in doing so, care is taken not to offend the Muslims. In this case too, the BJP criticized the Karnataka government and the Congress, but its opposition seemed to be nothing more than gaining political mileage in an election year.

The Bharatiya Janata Party's track record on Hindu temples is also not very good. In Karnataka, she has been in power four times, but she has done nothing. Basavarao Bomai, the chief minister of the previous BJP government, had even announced to free all temples in the state from the control of the government, but the bill was not even brought in the assembly. Shortly before, the BJP government in Uttarakhand had tried to bring important Hindu religious places like Badrinath, Kedarnath, Gangotri and Yamunotri under government control by enacting a law, but after heavy opposition from priests and public, the decision was withdrawn in view of the elections. 

The Hindu Religious Institutions and Charitable Endowments Act was enacted in Karnataka in 1997, when the Janata Dal was in power. The Act was amended in 2003 by the Congress government which started imposing tax on temples when SM Krishna was the Chief Minister. Earlier, tax was levied at the rate of 5% on temples with total revenue between Rs 5 to 25 lakh and 10% on temples with revenue above Rs 25 lakh, which the current Siddaramaiah government of Congress is trying to collect more by changing the slabs. But the main question is why tax only on Hindu temples? Why not on a mosque, church or gurudwara? If the objective is for the welfare of the temples and its employees, then why not create an autonomous temple council or Sanatan Parishad? Why interfere in the functioning of temples?

It is a matter of great happiness that Narendra Modi as Prime Minister has demonstrated deep faith in Sanatan Dharma and Sanskriti publicly and without any hesitation. Reaching the major temples, wearing saffron robes, offering prayers with sandalwood paste on the forehead and prostrating to the deity, it seems like a dream because independent India has also seen a Prime Minister who himself has never gone to worship in any temple, in the name of secularism, the President of the country was also prevented from participating in the inauguration ceremony of the renovated Somnath temple.

There is no doubt that Prime Minister Narendra Modi, by abandoning pseudo-secularism, due to his strong will power and faith in Hindu religion, aroused faith in religion and culture in Hindu society, which contributed significantly in establishing a new consciousness of Hindu self-respect. Sanatan Samaj is very happy with this, but power and position do not always remain, so it was expected that he would also run a cleansing campaign of the gunpowder that has been laid constitutionally and legally in the path of Sanatan Dharma. It is difficult to understand why despite having a full majority government at the Centre for 10 years, he could not make a central law for temple liberation, which did not cause any problem to any religion or sect, including Muslims and Christians. Every civilized society in the world is shocked that why in independent India the temples of the majority Hindus are not free, while the government has no control over the religious places of Muslims and Christians. The question is how many Mahabharata time temples can become the property of the Waqf Board, when Islam was not even born, why the land of ancient temples is being given to mosques and churches, how can clerics, imams and priests be paid salaries from temple offerings.

Due to anti-Hindu governments in many states, the situation is getting worse due to the terrible deterioration of Sanatan Dharma. If this is not stopped soon, Sanatan Dharma will become endangered in these states. Is it wrong for the Hindu society to know why Muslim priests were kept in some temples, who are also giving azaan at the time of aarti and worship? Christian should be made the chairman of the board of management of the famous Vishnu temple like Balaji Tirupati. Temples that once ran gurukuls are being entrusted with the responsibility of maintaining Muslim orphanage (Yateemkhanas), Hindus are being converted under government protection. And! All this when there is so called Hindu government at the Centre.

Many Modi fans slam him for brushing aside all the issues on which he came to power and started chanting only the development. More than making India a world leader, he was seen and engaged in this effort. The amount of hard work with which he raises the issues of development and talks about taking the economy to heights, if he had made as much effort for the strength and stability of Sanatan, then development would have happened automatically, and the economy would have reached new heights automatically. History witnessed that India remained the world's largest economy with a one-third share for about 1700 years from the 1st century to the 17th century. The biggest reason for this was the temple-based economy.

If Modi understands in time, the country can be saved, otherwise gradually this country of the world's oldest and advanced civilization is moving towards becoming an Islamic nation, it is only a matter of time.

Happily, this Karnataka bill could not be passed in the Legislative Council, so the law was narrowly avoided, at least till the Lok Sabha elections.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Shiv Mishra ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~