The Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court on Tuesday stated that the illegal & fake websites that are running in the temple names should get banned across Tamil Nadu and else anywhere.
These directions came on a petition seeking to block the websites operating names of major temples based in Tamil Nadu and actions against the website operators.
The petition was filed by devotee Subramanian and Markandan mentioniing “Majority have started unauthorized websites in the name of all the important temples that include Chennai Kapaleeswarar Temple, Srirangam Aranganathar Temple, Palani Murugan Temple, Madurai Meenakshi Amman Temple, Thanjai Periya Temple. The devotes offer money to the website believing that it belongs to the temple and such websites should get blocked.
The bench of justices Mahadevan and Sathya Narayana Prasad stated that “Cybercrimes must find out the sum total of the money that has been collected through websites. Thus, the website addresses that the temple should get known publicly through IT department”.
Furthermore, the bench added that the steps should be taken to carry out the donations and authorised websites.
The Bench added that “Whenever a complaint is being received regarding the fake websites then it should get investigated right away and for that legal action must be taken against such operators”
The judges stated further that temple in Tamil Nadu, like Sabarimala shrines and Tirupati, should be run in a transparent manner.
