The general secretary of the Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teerth Kshetra Trust, Champat Rai, and its member Anil Mishra have resigned "on moral grounds" following allegations of temple donation theft, a trust member confirmed on Saturday.
“Champat Rai and Anil Mishra have put in their papers on moral grounds. Their resignation letters have reached the chairman of the trust (Nritya Gopal Das),” Govind Dev Giri, treasurer of the trust, told reporters in the afternoon.
"Silver bricks and some gold items, which were in the news for the last few days, are safe with the trust," he added. He was alluding to claims by donors that they were not given receipts for silver and gold items they had handed over to trust members and that the valuables were missing.
Sources in the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), which Rai represents as its international vice-president, said a former BJP leader had leaked the news of theft of daily offerings and donations from the Ayodhya temple to the media on June 6, and AAP MP Sanjay Singh had raised it at a news conference the next day. The matter was later taken up by Congress and Samajwadi Party leaders.
Chief minister Yogi Adityanath formed an SIT to probe the allegations on June 13. The Opposition had excoriated the move because there was no precedent for an SIT probing a case without an FIR being registered against the accused.
The SIT named eight people involved in the theft, and the FIR was registered on June 25. They were arrested and sent to jail on Friday.
Speculation was rife on Friday about Rai and Mishra tendering their resignations, but the other trust members had denied any such development.
Giri issued a media release on Saturday stating that they had received the resignation letters, but remained silent on why he was continuing as the treasurer. He said the trust would take a decision on accepting the resignations at its next meeting.
A VHP leader in Lucknow claimed some bureaucrats were trying to take over the temple's control by cashing in on the controversy. "Nripendra Mishra, chairman of the temple construction committee, has said that a CEO should look after the management of the shrine. But we don’t approve of this and are going to write to the Centre not to commit this mistake,” the VHP leader told this newspaper.
Mishra declined to comment on the issue. "It would be a great sin to speak on the controversy when an inquiry is in progress,” he said in Ayodhya on Saturday.
Swami Vishwaprasanna Tirth, a trust member, said in Karnataka's Udupi on Saturday: “We have called a meeting of the trust in Ayodhya on July 11. We will discuss the issues related to the ongoing controversies and take a final decision.”