Subhechcha Ganguly 
The Odisha government’s request for extra time to nominate a full-time Chief Administrator of the Srimandir governing committee was refused by the Court in its ruling. The Odisha government has come under fire from the Supreme Court for allegedly disobeying its earlier directive on the hiring of a full-time administrator to oversee the business of the Lord Jagannath temple in Puri.On Wednesday, the State government was ordered to provide a comprehensive status report on compliance with its order issued in 2019 for the management of Srimandir by a bench made up of Justices MR Shah and CT Ravikumar.
The Odisha government’s request for extra time to nominate a full-time Chief Administrator of the Srimandir governing committee was refused by the Court in its ruling.The court had been asked by the State administration to extend the deadline until December 2023. “As of right now, we don’t know which instructions are followed and which are not. Within four weeks of today, a thorough status report on adherence to the various orders given by this court should be submitted. The bench ordered that an advance copy of the report be sent to the amicus.On November 4, 2019, the Court issued a directive requiring the government to quickly name a full-time Chief Administrator for the Srimandir managing committee in place of a part-time Administrator.
The Odisha government had earlier promised to record 64,000 acres of property in the name of the Sri Jagannath temple, Amicus curiae Ranjit Kumar informed the court. But, nothing new has happened in this aspect as of yet. The panel also demanded information regarding the Rs 5 crore spent on the children of the servant. The Court’s directive was followed, and the amount was sanctioned.
