The Vallabh Sampraday worships Lord Krishna as a joyous and playful deity, with Tilkayat ji as its supreme head. In the 1950s, there were controversies due to large-scale bungling in the properties of the sect’s main temple, one of the richest, in Nathdwara. Its takeover by the state was challenged without success before the Supreme Court, which negated the religious right claimed by Tilkayat ji to manage this temple and its assets, holding it to be a secular matter. The temple board, created by statute to manage its temporal affairs, except seva-puja and other matters of faith, is a unique blend of the spiritual lineage, state supervision and prominent devotees like the Ambanis. The Ram Janmabhoomi temple in Ayodhya was built with state support but without any state oversight. The latter is an imperative, not as a panacea, but to ensure transparency, accountability and institutional integrity.

The movement for the temple at........

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