‘You have no right to enter the temple’; Priest stops Dalit woman from entering temple
Uttar Pradesh. A Scheduled Caste woman was stopped by a priest from offering prayers in a temple in Bareilly, UP. On stopping the Dalit woman from worshiping, people started creating ruckus, after which people gathered around. All of them were opposing this incident. Somehow the matter calmed down. In the case, a complaint letter was given to the police station on behalf of the woman’s husband. Police has registered the case and started investigation.
Learn about the case in detail?
Vishnu Hari temple is present in Krishnanagar of Izzatnagar in Bareilly, UP. Poonam Kanojia lives in Krishna Nagar area only. Poonam Kanojia’s husband Rakesh Kumar is posted as Bade Babu in Inter College, Sirauli. Poonam told, “On February 16, 2023, I had reached the temple to worship with my daughter. The priest Ramesh Upadhyay present there and Shyam Sundar Upadhyay, the chairman of the worship committee, stopped me from worshiping.”
Poonam alleges, “The priests called me casteist words.” The priest said, ‘You don’t have the right to go inside the temple.’ Due to this she could not do the puja and had to return. And informed the matter to the husband.
Police registered a case and started investigation
In this case, on the Tahrir of Poonam’s husband Rakesh, the police have registered a case against priest Rakesh Upadhyay and committee chairman Shyam Sundar Upadhyay under SC-ST sections. The police is investigating the matter
There have been many cases before
In January last, the district administration of Tiruvannamalai district of Tamil Nadu allowed more than 300 Dalit community people to enter the temple after 200 years. For this several rounds of meetings were held with prominent community heads of the area, after which this became possible. Heavy police forces were also deployed outside the temple to prevent any untoward incident during the entry of Dalits into the temple.
On January 9, a Dalit youth, Ayush, was assaulted when he forcibly entered the sanctum sanctorum at Kaunwal Maharaj Temple in Salra village of Mori. It was alleged that the youth forcibly entered the Kaunwal Maharaj temple, the presiding deity of the area, in Salra village temple. Some youths of the village beat him fiercely. On the third day of the incident, the victim’s father Attar Lal got a case registered against five people of Bainol at Mori police station. On January 12, the accused were arrested from Bainol village and sent to jail.
