Prof. DM Deshpande
There are serious allegations of theft of donations and devotees offerings at Ayodhya’s Ram temple. Around Rs 7- 7.5 crore, it is alleged, have been siphoned off.
As the probe widens, there are disturbing details of possibly more money and persons in the scam. So far, eight key suspects have been arrested and nearly Rs 80 lakh plus another $1,121 in foreign exchange recovered from them, allegedly stolen from the temple’s donations and hundis.
The temple trust has an unenviable task of ensuring daily counting of large cash piles and valuable offerings in the form of gold, silver, jewellery. Clearly it appears that the trust didn’t have the capability nor did it try to build capacity to undertake the mammoth job.
Just to give a perspective, there are 40 donation boxes-hundis in the temple complex. Daily footfalls average 75,000 on a normal day; it rises by two to three times on special occasions and festivals. Kumbh Mela, a once in 12 year event, was last year. Ram temple opened for devotees in Jan 2023.
Daily collections are estimated between Rs 8 to Rs 13 lakh; it can go up to Rs 50 to Rs 60 lakh on festive days. Total value of offerings were of the order of Rs 153 crore in 2024-25; with interest income of Rs 173 crores on FD’s, the trust’s total income was a staggering Rs 327 crore.
In June the social media was abuzz with claims of theft at Ayodhya. When the opposition political party raised the issue on June 7, it quickly gained traction. After all, the Ram temple at Ayodhya is the most sacred abode of Shri Ram with crores of devotees in India and abroad.
Following the usual script, first there was denial of embezzlement; the trust that manages the Ram temple maintained that there were no wrongdoings and that the internal audit did not find any mismatch. However, a section of the local BJP unit too called for a SIT probe. Finally, when the Temple Construction Committee chairman and the trust member brought out several loopholes in cash handling and management of donations at the temple, the government ordered a SIT probe on June 13.
The SIT has submitted its initial preliminary report. As the probe has now widened beyond Ayodhya the state government has extended the tenure of the SIT till July 15. Lavkush Mishra, one of the eight accused and arrested, was considered close to Anil Mishra who is a functionary of the temple trust.
Along with his relative, Lavkush is alleged to have bought half a dozen properties in Ayodhya district. Especially, construction of a three storied building on a property he bought in his wife’s name over a 1000 sq.ft. plot has come under a scanner.
As per reports in the media, most of the alleged siphoning off of temple’s funds took place during and after Kumbh Mela at Prayagraj. It was not expected that the footfalls at the Ram temple would spurt so much, so suddenly, overwhelming every system that was devised for normal functioning.
Obviously, money flowed in hundis and donations, too, rose quickly as devotees flooded in thousands after or before visiting the Prayagraj. The police suspect an organised crime network to exploit a tremendous surge in offerings between January 13 and February 26, last year.
The investigators have uncovered another fund raising method to cheat unsuspecting devotees. Avinash Shukla, one of the prime accused, has allegedly placed unauthorized donation boxes with QR codes for digital payments at several places in the holy city of Ayodhya. All the boxes were marked Ramrajya Kosh. Since his arrest, these boxes have been removed although the one at the Yoga centre still remains where the accused was allegedly staying.
Almost everything that could possibly go wrong has gone wrong in the cash management of the Ram temple by the trust. The SIT preliminary report points out several glaring loopholes and deficiencies starting with insider collusion. Ramkrishna Yadav alias Tinnu, former driver of Champat Rai, the trust secretary, held keys to hundis.
There are allegations of scam in recruitment of temple staff, 125 of them, including allegations of charging commissions. Some of the outsourced staff were placed in sensitive roles which is pointer to a possible planned connivance. The appointment of cash counting in-charge, Subhash Srivatsava was allegedly at the behest of a top trust functionary.
The report mentions a list of issues arising out of ignoring/bypassing SOP’s. No frisking of counting staff both at the entry and exit times by the security personnel. SIT has raised eyebrows over the absence of security staff during counting. CCTV footage was maintained for 45 days while the standard norm is 180 days.
Since large amounts of cash was to be counted by multiple persons, the SBI mandated that the staff on this duty shall wear uniform that did not have pockets. This, too, was ignored which might have made the task easy for swindlers. The probe has also revealed that an employee would deliberately stand in front of the CCTV camera blocking the view while the cash bundles were manipulated.
This came to light when the authorities installed hidden cameras for a week that captured the men in acts of theft. There are allegations of fake bundles being added during documentation which were later removed before depositing in the bank.
There is no immediate answer to the question-how long this theft has been going on; the CCTV shows images of 45 days only. The probe is now being extended to see whether some bank employees too were complicit in the scandal. While some fire-fighting measures have been taken, what is required is a complete overhaul of the entire system.
The author has four decades of experience in higher education teaching and research. He is the former first vice-chancellor of ISBM University, Chhattisgarh
