Eight Ram temple and trust employees were arrested in Ayodhya on Friday morning on charges of stealing devotees’ offerings and donations, leading to media claims about resignations by two trust members that were followed by an official denial.
Local and national TV channels had reported that Champat Rai and Anil Mishra, general secretary and member of the Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teerth Kshetra Trust, had resigned on moral grounds following the arrests.
Police sources had earlier revealed that two of those arrested were relatives of Mishra, who also happens to be an RSS man and a homoeopath by profession.
However, trust administrator Gopal Rao laughed off the reports of the resignations, calling them “weird”. Rai and Mishra remained incommunicado.
Trust chairman Nritya Gopal Das denied knowledge of any resignations, saying: “I don’t know from where such information emerged.”
In the morning, the police had arrested Ram Shankar Yadav aka Tinu, a driver of the trust, and seven temple employees. Six of them were tasked with counting and recording the cash and valuables received as daily offerings or donations, while the seventh was their supervisor.
Police sources identified the arrested temple employees as Tinu’s nephew Manish Yadav; trust member Anil Mishra’s relatives Anukalp Mishra and Luvkush Mishra; Ramashankar Mishra, Avinash Shukla and Karunesh Pandey, recruited by the temple after Anukalp allegedly introduced them to senior trust members; and supervisor
Subhas Srivastava.
The eight suspects were produced before a court and sent to 14 days’ judicial custody.
They have been booked on the charges of theft from one’s employer, criminal breach of trust, receiving stolen property, criminal liability, criminal conspiracy and common intention.
Political brawl
Opposition leaders, who had targeted the BJP over the thefts at the temple — the Narendra Modi government’s showpiece political achievement — intensified their attacks following the arrests.
Aam Aadmi Party chief Arvind Kejriwal, who began a two-day tour of Ayodhya on Thursday evening, had dared the government to arrest the accused. On Friday, after a visit to the Ram temple and Hanuman Garhi temple, he claimed that only the small fry had been arrested.
“What about those who had appointed these thieves?” he asked.
A cornered BJP sought to portray the Opposition attacks as attempts to hurt Hindus’ religious sentiments.
Addressing a public meeting in Deoria, chief minister Yogi Adityanath warnedOpposition parties not tomake public statements onthe subject.
“We registered an FIR and arrested the accused as soon as the special investigation team submitted its report with me (on Wednesday)…. Nobody involved in playing with the religious sentiments of the people will be spared,” he said.
“Those who don’t believe in Lord Ram are speaking on the issue.”
Some Ayodhya residents and Aam Aadmi Party MP Sanjay Singh had been the first to allege the temple thefts early this month, with several Congress and Samajwadi Party leaders later joining in.
Singh submitted 11 documents with the SIT on Thursday, trying to substantiate his claim last year that the trust had bought land from local BJP leaders’ families at inflated prices.
A VHP source said Rai —who is also a VHP international vice-president and aformer RSS pracharak — had offered to resign last year following Singh’s allegationsof corrupt land deals butwas dissuaded.