Date:14/03/2003 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2003/03/14/stories/2003031401611300.htm

National

Notice to Centre, T.N. on temple ritual

By Our Legal Correspondent

NEW DELHI MARCH 13. The Supreme Court today issued notice to the Centre and the Tamil Nadu Government on a public interest petition to ensure that the "horrendous, barbaric and irrational practice" of burying children alive as part of a temple ritual in the State was not perpetuated.

A Bench, comprising the Chief Justice V.N. Khare and Justice S.B. Sinha, issued the notice on a petition from Common Cause seeking a direction to the respondents to devise programmes to educate the people about the dangers of this religious practice which violated the fundamental rights of the citizen.

The petition brought to the notice of the court a temple ritual practised in Perayur village near Madurai in Tamil Nadu in August last in which children were buried alive for about a minute.

Appearing for the petitioner, senior counsel Ashwani Kumar submitted that the incident had shocked the conscience of the nation and pleaded with the court to intervene to ensure that the practice was put to an end.

He said it was indeed a matter of serious concern that such a ritual was being practised in the modern age.