Tushar Mehta tells Supreme Court Centre will not control temples
The central government told the Supreme Court it has no interest in taking over temples. Instead, its job is just to handle the economic and political side of things, not religious rituals.
As Solicitor General Tushar Mehta put it, the government does not want to control temples and was referring to a constitutional interpretation of Article 25(1)(a).
State boards oversee thousands of temples
Across India, state-run boards look after thousands of temples—like Kerala's state-supervised Devaswom Boards, including the Travancore Devaswom Board, (about 3,000 temples), Tamil Nadu's department (over 30,000), and Andhra Pradesh's Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanam Trust Board.
This setup is now under debate, with people questioning how much control states should really have over religious places.