Bhubaneswar: The state government on Thursday made public the assets lying in the treasury of the Jagannath temple in Puri.
The jewellery details that were made public were part of the inventory that had been made in 1978. Besides jewellery, Lord Jagannath has nearly 60,000 acres of land spread across the country. Most of the land, however, lies encroached.
In response to a question, law minister Pratap Jena told the Assembly: "The temple management committee had done the inventory of the jewellery in 1978. The inventory making process was going on for nearly two months from May 13, 1978, to July 23, 1978, both of the inner and outer chamber of the ratna bhandar."
The outer chamber of the ratna bhandar has jewellery that the Lord uses daily and during his annual rituals. The inner chamber stores jewellery that the deities do not use.
According to the assessment, the Lord has 12,831 bhari (nearly 128.31 kg of gold) and 22,153 bhari (221.53kg) of silver. However, 14 items of gold and silver were not accounted for during the assessment process. The inventory does not mention the reson for not including those.
If one assesses its market value, the cost of the gold would come to around Rs 41 crore and price of silver Rs 91 lakh. However, it has not included the donations, including jewellery, the temple has received from 1978 to 2018. The administration had made an inventory of the jewellery in 1926. Later, it was published on September 3, 1957, and is mentioned in the record of rights of the temple.
However, several servitors believe that all of the rooms inside the ratna bhandar were yet to be opened yet. Senior servitor Ramakrushna Dasmohapatra told The Telegraph: "The administration has opened only a few rooms, but there are many inside the ratna bhandar that are yet to be unlocked. If all these rooms are opened up, the wealth will go beyond one's imagination. Similarly, the temple administration should do an inventory of all the donations it has received between 1978 and 2018."
Though in early April, the state government had decided to make an inventory of the ratna bhandar, it had refrained from doing so due to a public outcry against it. The team did not enter the inner chambers of the ratna bhandar, which is situated inside the shrine's sanctum sanctorum.
On the issue of landed properties, law minister Jena said: "We have so far detected 60,418.35 acres of land belonging to the Lord Jagannath. Out of this, 33,843.64 acres of land has already been recorded in the name of the Jagannath temple. There are 395.25 acres of land in the name of the temple outside the state. Steps are being taken to recover the land and regularise land records."
A temple official said that, several devotees had recorded their land in the name of the Lord as their last wish. But over the years, people have encroached on them. While a bulk of this land is spread over 23 districts of Odisha, 395.25 acres has been found in six states.
According to the temple's official records, 17.02 acres of land is located in Andhra Pradesh, 322.93 acres in Bengal, 28.21 acres in Maharashtra, 25.11 acres in Madhya Pradesh, 0.274 acres in Bihar and 1.7 acres in Chhattisgarh.
"We are in touch with the respective district collectors to get back those acres. The land would be sold and money earned from it would be used for making fixed deposits in the Lord's name," a senior temple official said.
