HR&CE Department verifies data from documents for 3,43,647 acres
Title documents like pattas, chittas and even gift deeds belonging to thousands of temples in the State will be available online on the Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments (HR&CE) Department’s website.
The Department has completed the matching of data from documents for 3,43,647 acres of land with that on Tamil Nilam, the State’s land records’ repository, said an official. “This amounts to over 70% of land belonging to temples in the State that have 4,78,272 acres under their control. People can go check the lands owned by individual temples on the Department’s site. The documents can be viewed and they have a disclaimer that they cannot be used for anything else,” the official said.
The remaining lands have been divided into two — those that match partially with the Tamil Nilam data and those that are not found on it.
“We will take steps to bring back land that originally belonged to the temples, but subsequently got transferred to other names. This has already been initiated in many temples,” an official said.
Minister for HR&CE P.K. Sekar Babu has started retrieving land belonging to temples.
“Chief Minister M.K. Stalin is very particular that interests of the temples should be safeguarded. There have been cases where houses have been constructed on land owned by temples. We will ensure that such people become tenants and the revenue goes to the temples,” he said.
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