In­de­pen­dent Sen­a­tor De­oroop Teemul says the coun­try should not dis­miss the des­e­cra­tion of tem­ples. He said there are re­ports that po­lice of­fi­cers are of­ten dis­mis­sive of these in­ci­dents.

As he be­gan his con­tri­bu­tion to the de­bate on the 2024 Na­tion­al Bud­get in the Sen­ate yes­ter­day, Teemul said that as a cit­i­zen and Hin­du, he must con­demn the act of des­e­cra­tion of the Rameela site at the Tarou­ba Recre­ation Ground last week­end. He said days lat­er, some­one threw stones at ve­hi­cles and oth­er struc­tures at a school housed in a tem­ple com­pound in Freeport.

The Cou­va/Tabaquite/Tal­paro Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion (CT­TRC) is­sued a me­dia re­lease yes­ter­day con­demn­ing at­tacks on the Prana­vanan­da Ashram at Tem­ple Dri­ve, Beau­car­ro Road. The CT­TRC re­port­ed stones were thrown along with de­bris on­to the com­pound while over 80 devo­tees, in­clud­ing pres­i­dent Su­jeet Kan­hai and the pun­dit, of­fered Kanya Ku­mari pu­ja. 

“We strong­ly con­demn this ac­tion and any oth­er form of vi­o­lence or dis­crim­i­na­tion based on re­li­gion or eth­nic­i­ty. Our re­gion is found­ed on prin­ci­ples of re­spect, uni­ty, and di­ver­si­ty, and these val­ues are fun­da­men­tal to who we are as a com­mu­ni­ty. An at­tack on one faith is an at­tack on all of us, and as a coun­cil, we stand in sol­i­dar­i­ty with all re­li­gions,” the CT­TRC stat­ed.

Teemul lament­ed a string of at­tacks on tem­ples in the past three years that devo­tees re­port­ed to po­lice.

“From what I gath­ered by in­ter­act­ing with those who use these fa­cil­i­ties—I per­son­al­ly vis­it­ed a cou­ple of them af­ter the des­e­cra­tions—is that they think that the po­lice are dis­mis­sive of these in­ci­dents and that a va­grant or men­tal­ly dis­turbed per­son is do­ing this and that is the sort of gen­er­al mes­sage that is com­ing across,” Teemul said. He said some­one de­lib­er­ate­ly tak­ing al­co­hol and meat in­to a tem­ple shows a high lev­el of think­ing and that these in­ci­dents may start small but grow more se­ri­ous.

Op­po­si­tion Sen­a­tor Dr Tim Gopeesingh said it was of na­tion­al im­por­tance and the Gov­ern­ment should con­sid­er it as the Con­sti­tu­tion recog­nis­es the re­li­gious rights of all cit­i­zens.

The Sen­ate swore in Gopeesingh as a tem­po­rary sen­a­tor to re­place Anil Roberts who is ill. Gopeesingh con­demned the des­e­cra­tion of the ef­fi­gy of the king of the demons, Rawan, in Tarou­ba.

He said he ex­pect­ed the Min­is­ter in the Min­istry of the At­tor­ney Gen­er­al and Le­gal Af­fairs Renu­ka Sagram­s­ingh-Sook­lal to con­demn the act as she was Hin­du. How­ev­er, he said the Gov­ern­ment Sen­a­tor be­longs to a Gov­ern­ment that failed to con­demn these acts of des­e­cra­tion.

“We call up­on the PNM Gov­ern­ment to al­so con­demn it, and they failed to do so, and we lis­ten to see whether the ho­n­ourable Prime Min­is­ter will con­demn it or the Min­is­ter of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty will con­demn it,” Gopeesingh said.

He called on Hinds to di­rect his team to probe and en­sure there are strict penal­ties for the des­e­cra­tion.