Cultural and political Backgroud of Hindu Religious Endowment Acts in Southern India

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The aim of this project is to understand the background and history of acts concerning Hindu temple controls in South India in both colonial and post-colonial periods. It mainly relies on two sources, one is The Indian Law Reports (Madras), and the other is records of lawsuits concerning the Nataraja Temple of Chidambaram.The first volume of The Indian Law Reports (Madras) was published in 1876. This journal contains many cases of conflicts over local temples. However, nobody has done systematic investigations on them. This project focuses on the period from 1876 to 1929, a period characterised by so-called colonial policy of non-interference into religious affairs. There were 60 cases over temple issues during this period. They tell that, inspite of the non-interference policy, the temple matters were thoroughly investigated through a series of lawsuits. 11 cases out of 60 were concerned with the relevance of the law to the temple issues, but did not directly challenge the authority of the colonial government. This trend changed later in 1930's, when the govenment changed the policy, and the direct confrontation between the temple and the government became more common.A case history of the lawsuits concerning the Nataraja temple basically confirms the above general trend. In the late 19th centuty, the main issue was a conflict between two factions of the temple trustee-priests. Then from 1933 onwards, the dispute between the government and the temple trustees (priests) became dominant. The tentative conclusion of the project is as follows : as each temple has a complex localised history, we canmnot give a general pictute of the temple disputes, but it is certainly true that every temple has to rely on the legal and judicial system. In this sense the religious affairs have become controlled by the secular system.