March 15 – Documents made available to Selliyal.com confirmed that the 118 year old Sri Ramalingeswarar temple in Bangsar, Kuala Lumpur, has been deregistered by the Registrar of Societies (ROS) on the 13th of February 2014. However there has been no formal announcement by the Temple Committee as of today.
Reliable sources linked to the temple also confirmed that the ROS has advised that the routine Poojas, prayers and other rituals can be carried out at the temple without any problems.
It is also reliably learned that the Bank accounts of the temple have also been frozen following the de-registration of the Temple by the ROS.
Why the deregistration?
One of the former committee members of the Temple, not willing to disclose his name, told Selliyal.com that the Temple committee did not conduct its annual general meetings for the last 4 years beginning from 2010 and consequently the accounts of the temple was also not audited and presented to the ROS as required by the Temple’s constitution and Malaysian laws.
This prompted ROS to issue a show cause notice to the temple committee on the 25th of September 2013, asking as to why the temple committee should not be de-registered based on the complaints that the AGMs have not been held and accounts not submitted. The temple also failed to conduct elections in 2011 to elect a new Management committee as per the the constitution of the temple.
In the same show cause letter ROS also pointed out that the temple committee has breached the rules of its constitution by appointing a Secretary who resides outside Kuala Lumpur. Temple sources said that the Sri Ramalingeswarar temple was constructed by Railway workers residing in Kuala Lumpur and therefore the constitution stipulated that the Chairman, Secretary and Treasurer of the temple at all times must be an employee or former employee of Malaysian Railways or KTM as it is now called and these office bearers must be residing in Kuala Lumpur.
ROS, in its show cause letter, further demanded why the sum of RM 1,115,191-00 held in fixed deposits with the bank had been withdrawn by the temple committee without first obtaining four fifth of the members present in an AGM again as required by the constitution.
The temple committee then submitted its reply for the show cause letter but the ROS was not satisfied with the reasons given by the temple committee.
Letter to deregister the temple
In a letter dated 13th February 2014 the ROS subsequently issued an order to the temple committee that the committee is now de-registered, citing that the reasons forwarded by the temple committee were not satisfactory. The temple has 30 days to appeal against the decision and the dateline expired on 13th of March 2014.
Again there has been no formal announcement by the temple whether an appeal against deregistration has been submitted to the ROS but sources close to the temple said that an appeal has been submitted.
Sri Ramalingeswarar temple in Bangsar, (Jalan Maarof) which has been in existence for the last 118 years is one of the oldest temples in the country. With bank accounts frozen and temple committee de-registered the fate of the temple is yet to be determined.
One possible consequence is that, if the appeal against deregistration is not successful, then the assets and management of the temple could be placed under the custody of the Malaysian Insolvency Department until a new committee is elected at the Annual General meeting.This possibility is further supported by the fact that the ROS has copied the letter to de-register the temple to the Malaysian Insolvency Department, which gives rise to speculations of such an eventuality.
