New Delhi: It is clear now that there is more than a whiff of scandal in the management of the Ram Janmabhoomi temple at Ayodhya. It began with allegations, charges, counter-charges, and politics. Then the state government set up a Special Investigating Team. A First Information Report has been registered, eight persons arrested, and more are being questioned. Two key members of the 15-member trust that runs the temple—set up under orders of the Supreme Court of India in 2019—have resigned. Those resignations have not yet been accepted; all this is now officially known.
Temple run: It can be said with some authority now that a lot has gone wrong with the management of the temple, and that a lot of the devotees’ money has fallen into wrong hands, or simply been stolen. Investigating agencies say that they have carried out raids and already recovered almost Rs 80 lakh, which looks like it was taken from donation boxes.
This is quite an embarrassment for the temple management; many of them backed the idea of this temple for many decades. People like Champat Rai and Anil Mishra, the two members of the trust who have resigned, fought for the temple for a very long time. For them to be seen in this light is really bad, and it raises questions about the commitment of those who are manning the temple in the name of devotion.
Song sung true: I can start by recalling the lines from a 1956 song from a Raj Kapoor film called Jaagte Raho. It’s an eternal song, in Punjabi, titled Te ki main jhoot boleya (did I lie?). It’s basically about hypocrisy, about how dishonest people are while they claim to be pious.
It’s written by Shailendra, who was also a Leftist, and composed by Salil Chowdhury. One stanza says: Dekhe pandit gyani dhyani daya dharam de bande, Ram naam jap dete khande gaushala de chande, meaning, ‘I’ve seen all these learned people who claim to be great devotees of God, they chant the name of Ram, but they then gobble up the funds collected in the names of gaushalas.’ That is precisely what seems to have happened in this case.
Uttar Pradesh politics is in a tizzy because the people allegedly involved are from the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP). Some of those arrested were working closely with people from the VHP.
Money talks: On 5 June, some cash was discovered by security people in the pockets of some temple employees during a routine check. A video statement then appeared, featuring one Mahipal Singh who worked at the temple between 2021 and 2023. He said that money was being stolen, not being counted properly, that he was witness to the fact that the staff of State Bank of India—where donations were finally being deposited—were in cahoots with the counting staff, and sometimes the bundles of cash put in the boxes to be taken out had more money than counted and listed. He also alleged that surveillance footage of everything that happens in the temple, particularly the counting process, had been deleted for a long period.
Funds and games: This soon became political; Opposition leader and Samajwadi Party (SP) chief Akhilesh Yadav raised this question the very next day, alleging that crores of the temple wealth was missing and calling for an investigation. Thing moved quickly from here. Former SP legislator MLA Pawan Pandey said that Rs 7 -7.5 crore had been embezzled. Then, Lucknow-based advocate Mohit Ashok, a high court lawyer, went to the Allahabad High Court seeking an inquiry.
On 13 June, Yogi Adityanath with great alacrity, and formed a 3-member SIT. All are civil servants: Lucknow Divisional Commissioner Vijay Vishwas Pant, Inspector General of Police Kiran S. and Special Secretary (Finance) Neel Ratan Kumar. They were to submit an interim report, and they did in about 10 days. What happened after that is interesting.
The Dubey bomb: On 16 June, one more voice arose and this was former kar sevak Santosh Dubey. He said that not only cash but lots of valuables had also been looted, because lots of devotees donate jewellery or ornaments or gold to the temple. Also that when the initial call was made to karsevaks and devotees to contribute a brick each to the temple, many had sent bricks of gold. All had disappeared, he said.
Dubey borrowed a line from 16th century Sufi saint Kabir: Ram naam ki loot hai, loot sake to loot, meaning money is available for free, take what you can. What Kabir meant in the original full doha, or couplet, was that spiritual wealth is available to every human being, so go and grab it. The second line of the couplet is Ant kaal pachtayega jab praan jayenge chur, that you will regret it on the day you meet your maker. From that, Dubey took the first line and used it in sarcasm, deeply hurting the Bharatiya Janata Party, VHP, RSS and all those who fought all this while to get the temple.
Here come the heavies: On 11 June, Mahant Kamal Nayan Das, seen as a designated successor to longtime Trust president Nritya Gopal Das, said any irregularities found should be investigated and addressed. Then came Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, of the Vinesh Phogat infamy. He is the one charged with misbehaving with several female wrestlers. Reinstated by the BJP, Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh came out and said, “If I speak the truth, I could land in serious trouble because the people involved are very influential. We do not have the courage to speak openly now and more investigation should take place.”
Then Murli Dhar Singh, from the public relations department and who was media coordinator when the temple inauguration took place, demanded a fair and impartial inquiry.
Needle of suspicion: Champat Rai has been vice-president of the VHP and was a close associate of the parishad’s titan Ashok Singhal. He has also been an RSS pracharak.
Then there’s Anil Mishra, a key figure with the RSS and also a real heavyweight in Ayodhya. Mishra and his wife played the role of Pradhan Yajman, or chief host, at the Pran Pratistha ceremony. He’s also been Prant Karyavah, or state head, of the RSS in the Awadh region.
Inner voices: While this was going on, a voice also arose from a former VHP, RSS and BJP leader, Vinay Katiyar. Katiyar is not so significant today, but he has been national general secretary and vice president of the BJP at the Centre. He has also been the Uttar Pradesh state BJP chief. And he said that “thousands of people have made sacrifices. Kalyan Singh even resigned as chief minister to get this temple and now money is being stolen from this temple.”
Former principal secretary to the Prime Minister Nripendra Mishra, a very respected civil servant, had been assigned charge of building the temple. He is also on the Ram Janmabhoomi Trust. One of his first interviews on the issue was to Neelam Pandey of ThePrint, where he made significant points.
He said that there were lots of problems with the temple management and the temple needed a new management, suggesting a Chief Executive Officer on the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanam model, but with experience in Uttar Pradesh. That means whoever becomes CEO should know Uttar Pradesh and should have served there. He said that the top management at the temple should have a formal pattern, a hierarchy. And he said devotees will feel cheated even if a pie, a fraction of a paisa, is lost.
Elsewhere, he said, “I would say that the Prime Minister is worried. There are two types of worries that the Prime Minister has. One, money of the devotees if it’s been stolen. And second, that this is a completely shabby system. It’s a broken system.”
He told the New Indian Express that the idea was that all those who come to count the money will come without any pockets, which means they can’t take anything with them. That hasn’t happened. Now a system is being set up so that people who come in to count will not have any pockets.
To ABP News, he said that the theft at the Ram temple was open loot. These are strong statements and he would not make them unless a move was really being made to reform the management of the temple.
How embarrassing has it been to the VHP? They was the first to demand an FIR in the case. VHP National President Alok Kumar, at their meeting in Haridwar, said that a fast track court should be set up for speedy trial. The VHP also cancelled its annual meeting in Ayodhya on June 25 – 29.
Kin Ship: The eight arrests made have two significant names. One is Ram Shankar alias Tinnu Yadav. Yadav used to work as a driver with Champat Rai but also helped with counting and also had keys to the boxes where cash was kept.
His nephew Manish Yadav was involved in counting as well. Ram Shankar Mishra was also in the counting operation. He had also employed his son and son-in-law.
So everything that’s wrong usually in the Indian system you can find here, including nepotism. Another of those arrested, Anukalp Mishra is a relative of Anil Mishra. Once again, you can see that this was not being run in any professional way.
A question of trust: In November 2019, the Supreme Court ruled that the temple can be built, and that land and money should also be allocated for a mosque to be built some distance away. Following that Supreme Court order, the Prime Minister announced in February 2020, within three months of the order, that a trust had been set up; Nripendra Mishra was appointed to lead the process.
Fifteen members were appointed to the trust, set up under a gazette notification of the state government. There was no statutory structure or protection, no law was passed. All over India, where temples are managed in such structures, either there is a state law, or it comes under the ambit of the larger state law. In this case, this became a completely autonomous structure with no oversight.
The road not taken: The South has the largest number of temples. They are actually also the cleanest temples in India. Almost all the significant temples in the South are managed by structures, controlled by the government under their respective endowment laws. And this applies to Andhra, Telangana, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, even Puducherry.
Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanam, Meenakshi Amman at Madurai, Guruvayur, Brihadeshwara temple at Thanjavur, Sabarimala, Mookambika temple in Karnataka: all are managed by systems and structures set up by these respective state governments under their endowment laws. The chief executive is usually an Indian Administrative Service officer.
This kind of structure has also had controversies. Tirupati had its controversy about what kind of ghee was used in making the laddus. The initial allegations were that some kind of animal fat was used. But later it turned out that it wasn’t quite animal fat but palm oil and other stuff. Somebody made money; no system is corruption-proof.
Another temple management system is at Vaishno Devi. A shrine board was set up under a 1988 law. Jagmohan was then the Governor of Jammu and Kashmir. And he immediately took over the shrine and cleaned things up. So what used to be a really messy shrine became among the cleanest and among the best managed. In fact, that is something for which people of Jammu and Kashmir, particularly people of Jammu and the Hindu community, remember Jagmohan. Since then, the temple has not had any problem or any scandal. There has been controversy but of a political kind.
Look at Tirupati. Tirupati has so much money. They can lend money to the government. They can lend money or contribute money for expansion or building of the Tirupati airport. They have set up any number of colleges – engineering colleges, medical colleges, schools, even the Sri Venkateshwara College in Delhi. In fact, you find so many institutions in the name of Sri Venkateshwara. That’s been done with the money contributed by the devotees.
The Vaishno Devi Board also set up a medical college. That saw a controversy this year because some people complained that too many selected students were Muslims. That happened because medical college admissions are meritocratic. But there was no misappropriation or stealing of funds of any kind.
The next model is the Sikh Gurudwara model. In 1925, the British passed a law, now called the Shiromani Gurudwara Prabhandhak Committee Act (SGPC Act), under which an elected body manages the key Sikh Gurdwaras including the Golden Temple in Amritsar. Elections take place every five years and the state election commission conducts that election. There is an elaborate system set up to use that money, mainly for educational purposes and other charities. That system has worked out quite well so far, quite flawlessly, except the fact that elections have not taken place since 2011.
Ayodhya question: Let us see what reform takes place at Ayodhya and where it goes. There is a great deal of politics here. Note the alacrity with which Yogi Adityanath moved. Remember, Yogi Adityanath is not from the RSS. If anything, he had his own organization, the Hindu Yuva Vahini. He is now Hindu Hriday Samrat in his own right in Uttar Pradesh, but he doesn’t owe it to the RSS directly. Those put to embarrassment in this case are from the RSS and VHP. Other complex or complicated internal BJP politics could be at play here, but that’s something to be taken up as more evidence emerges.
(Edited by Nardeep Singh Dahiya)
Also Read: VHP chief opposes Ayodhya Bar Assn’s refusal to represent Ram Temple donation theft accused
Donations in temple premises must be stopped.
The temple should announce crowd-funding programs and ask only as much money as they need, for specific needs like : salary, maintenance, welfare programs etc.
Donors should ve given tickets for fast darshan lines.
Donations in kind, should be done at the bank directly, and receipt should be issued. And that too limited donations should ve done.