6 months ago
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The Kerala High Court-appointed peculiar probe squad (SIT) probing the misappropriation of gold-plated panels from the Sabarimala Ayyappa temple has recorded the statements of 2 tantris (chief priests) of the temple.
Officials said the SIT had summoned Tantri Kandararu Rajeevaru and Tantri Kandararu Mohanaru to the Kerala State Crime Branch bureau astatine Enchakkal, Thiruvananthapuram, perchance up of the commencement of the Mandala-Makaravilakku season, during which customized mandated their beingness astatine Sabarimala.
The cardinal development, which surfaced successful the nationalist domain somewhat belatedly connected Wednesday (November 26, 2025), signalled that the probe had touched upon the Sabarimala temple’s priestly orthodoxy.
Officials said the probe besides focussed connected the main accused, Unnikrishnan Potti, and his tenure arsenic an adjutant to an adjunct clergyman astatine Sabarimala during the 2004-08 period. Subsequently, Mr Potti served arsenic a clergyman astatine the Ayyappa Temple successful Jalahalli, Bengaluru, Karnataka.
They said the SIT’s involvement appeared piqued aft preliminary investigations revealed that the members of the tantri’s household besides served arsenic the main clergyman of the Jalahalli Ayyappa Temple patronised by affluent Ayyappa devotees successful Bengaluru.
The SIT had besides recovered that the members of the tantri’s household had performed backstage pujas astatine the houses and concern premises of affluent Ayyappa devotees successful Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Chennai, allegedly astatine Mr. Potti’s behest. Officials said the SIT appeared keen to find whether Mr. Potti shared a financially symbiotic narration with the thantri family.
Moreover, the Travancore Devaswom Board (TDB) had sought the token spiritual authorisation of the tantris, arsenic mandated by custom, to manus implicit the gold-plated copper moulds covering the temple’s chromatic carvings and sculptures to Mr Potti for restoration successful 2019.
(Industrialist Vijay Mallya had donated the pricey panels to the temple successful 1998, and these had subsequently frayed and mislaid the archetypal aureate sheen.)
Officials said the main priests reportedly claimed that they had nary anterior cognition that the TDB had allowed Mr Potti to transport the gold-plated panels extracurricular the temple precincts for restoration.
Moreover, the tantris reportedly stated to the SIT that they had confined themselves solely to the purely ritual enactment of seeking the presiding deity’s grace to dismantle and repair the temple property.
Earlier, the SIT had accused the fishy TDB officials of dismantling the gold-plated copper moulds successful the lack of authoritative smiths and handing them implicit to a backstage person, Mr Potti, for repair, successful usurpation of the Sabarimala Temple manual, and also, suspiciously, miscategorising the gilded panels arsenic made of axenic copper.
The SIT besides recovered that Mr Potti kept the gilded artefacts successful his backstage custody for a protracted period, an estimated 42 days, and chartered retired these to affluent devotees for backstage veneration astatine their homes and concern premises.
The High Court had besides flagged suspicion that the TDB’s questionable determination had opened the doorway to the imaginable smelting of the pricey alloy for gold, oregon to replicating the artefacts to merchantability the originals to affluent collectors successful the state oregon abroad.
Meanwhile, Tantri Kandararu Rajeevaru told reporters astatine Pathanamthitta connected Wednesday that helium had “honestly answered” SIT’s questions.
