Bengaluru, 13 Aug

Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Tuesday said State government will seek to vacate the stay by High Court against the implementation of Chamundeshwari Kshetra Development Authority Act of 2024.

Karnataka High Court had stayed the implementation of the act, after a member of the erstwhile Mysuru royal family — Pramoda Devi Wadiyar — challenged its legality.

Passed in February, the act aims to provide for constituting an independent statutory authority to undertake the "development and maintenance" of 'Shree Chamundeshwari Kshethra'.

Home Minister G Parameshwara said authorities are formed for certain temples to ensure effective administration, as more money gets collected there, and also to provide good facilities to many devotees who visit them.

"Money gets collected there, the government also gives money. To manage the administration, if an authority is there it will be better. So it was done in the case of Chamundi hills...They (royal family) have said it should not be done, the court will examine," he told reporters here.

The interim stay was first granted on 26 July by Justice SR Krishna Kumar, who ordered that "....without prejudice to both the parties and by way of an interim arrangement, respondents are directed not to give effect to the impugned Act, till the next date of hearing." The stay was then extended on 1 August by Justice Hemant Chandangoudar, and the case is scheduled to be heard again on 22 August.

Pramoda Devi Wadiyar termed the Act "unconstitutional" contending that Chamundi Hill is their private property. She has alleged that the government had enacted it with an intention to take over the ownership, control and management of Chamundeshwari temple and other temples in Chamundi Hills under the guise of development and maintenance. —PTI