NEW DELHI, MAY 1: You may think that Lakshmi is the Indian goddess for wealth and prosperity. For the Government of Haryana, however, it is Sheetala Mata. The Haryana government has adopted a novel way to make builders ``contribute'' towards improving the facilities at the ancient temple of Sheetala Mata in Gurgaon, which it took over in 1991. The Shree Sheetala Mata Devi Shrine Board, with Chief Minister Om Prakash Chautala as its chairman, organised a meeting on Thursday.It was presided over by the new Deputy Commissioner of Gurgaon, A K Singh, and was held at the Haryana Urban Development Authority (HUDA) Gymkhana Club on Thursday. All prominent builders were invited to discuss the issue of ``contributions''. The invitation letter, signed by former DCP T C Gupta who was also present at the meeting, read: ``The resources of the Shrine Board are limited.. This matter was discussed in the meeting on April 9, and it was emphasised that builders/colonisers/other persons of Gurgaon should be motivated to adopt this noble cause in a big way.''Speaking to The Indian Express, the DCP said: ``Though I joined only two days ago, I can tell you with authority that there is no pressure on anybody. The shrine was taken over after a government act in 1991. All the builders cooperated with the government.'' The manner in which the meeting was conducted betrayed no sign of pressure being applied on the builders. This reporter, who attended the meeting incognito for about 10 minutes, also found nothing which could be described as anything other than cordial.When asked, a representative of a prominent building house said: ``No, there is absolutely no force.'' ``What is wrong in paying for a good cause? If I earn so much from selling flats there, why cannot we give it back to the place?'' said another builder.Yet there was nervousness writ large on the faces of a group of three representatives of a prominent real-estate firm standing in a Gymkhana corridor. It was 3.30 pm and they were late by an hour. To go in or not, was the big question. Five minutes of deliberations, and two of them decided to go in. The one who stayed back said: ``We had promised work worth Rs 1 crore each, but we could manage to do work worth only Rs 20 lakh.'' Meanwhile in the meeting, builders were requested to quote a figure they would be ``able'' to ``contribute''.Speaking to a representative of one company, an official of the Haryana government said: ``We are expecting at least Rs 50 lakh.'' To that, the representative replied: ``Sir, we are not authorised to make any commitment at this stage. We are here only to represent our company.''While all builders agreed that the cause is, indeed, a noble one, they disagreed when it came to discussing what will happen if they do not undertake the work committed to the government.``Look, we do not pay any money to the government. We simply carry out some development work by using our men and material,'' said the representative of a company. Another builder said: ``We are not opposed to building some additional facilities. But it should not be done under any pressure. We depend on the administration for every small little thing. If we refuse to pay up, then all the clearances that we seek from the authorities will get stalled.''The Indian Express visited the ancient temple of Sheetala Mata. Most prominent builders in Gurgaon had their site offices. ``Builders offered to donate to the temple trust in 1997-98. Since then, we have had a lot of construction in the temple's 16-acre campus,'' says an office bearer of the trust, managing the day-to-day affairs of the temple.The forecourt of the temple was done up with marble during 1997-1998. The district gazetteer dates the origin of the temple back to some 300 years, when Chaudhari Ram Singh, a local landlord, built the temple after ``he saw the goddess in his dreams''. Thousands of devotees visit the temple during the months of March-April. ``Every year, around this time of the year, a mela is held for which lakhs of devotees visit the shrine,'' adds the office-bearer.
