Bhubaneswar: Scion of the erstwhile royal family of Puri, Gajapati Dibya Singh Deb, on Thursday made it clear that the key of the inner chamber of the ratna bhandar, the treasury of Lord Jagannath, was not with him.

Deb's clarification comes in the wake of reports in a section of media that the key was with the king.

The state government has already set up a judicial commission, which will be headed by retired judge of Orissa High Court Justice Raghubir Das, to find out how the 25-inch brass key of the ratna bhandar went missing.

Deb, who is now in USA, in his letter said: "After the Odisha government took over management of the Srimandir from my late revered father Gajapati Maharaja Birakishore Deb in 1960 (pursuant to implementation of Shri Jagannath Temple Act, 1955), the keys of the inner Ratna Bhandar have always been in the custody of the concerned government functionaries. After 1960, at no point of time the Gajapati has been entrusted with the keys of the Inner Ratna Bhandar nor has he been involved in any way with the handling of the said keys."

He said: "Since 1960, the Gajapati has been entrusted with the custody of one out of the three keys of outer Ratna Bhandar and his authorised representative attends every opening of outer Ratna Bhandar with the said key, as and when required by the Srimandir Administration. I may add here that the outer Ratna Bhandar cannot be opened unless all the three custodians of the keys - representative of the Gajapati, Srimandir administrator and Srimadir Bhandar-mekapa (custodian of the treasury) - are present with the keys in their respective custody," Deb said.

He said the few times that the inner ratna bhandar had been opened after 1960, it has been the srimandir administrator, and the Puri collector who had been involved with the handling and custody of the keys of the inner treasury.

Deb also said how at the management committee meeting on April 4 he had come to know about the missing inner keys. "After thorough discussion, the committee directed the officers concerned to carry out further search to locate the keys in case they were not found, then the further course of action would be decided by the committee in subsequent meetings," the letter said.

Reacting to Union petroleum minister Dharmendra Pradhan's statement in which he questioned chief minister Naveen Patnaik's silence onthe issue for the last two months, law minister Pratap Jena said: "No politics should be done over Lord Jagannath, Gajapati and Shankaracharya who are attached to the sentiments of millions of devotees."

Jena also asked Pradhan to keep faith in the judicial system and not indulge in politics over the sensitive matter.

Pradhan said: "If the ratna bhandar key has actually gone missing it is a serious matter. The chief minister, who invariably maintains on even small issues that law will take its own course, has surprisingly kept quiet on the issue."