Sabarimala pooja materials purchase: Kerala HC extends deadline for accounts audit

Kochi: High court on Friday granted the state audit department an additional three weeks to examine the accounts related to the procurement of pooja materials for the ‘Ashtabhishekam’ conducted at Sabarimala temple over the past 10 years and submit a report on whether the Travancore Devaswom Board (TDB) had incurred any loss from the sales.

The bench of Justices V Raja Vijayaraghavan and K V Jayakumar issued the order after noting that TDB had not handed over the documents to the audit department due to certain confusion regarding an earlier court order. The court further directed TDB to hand over the documents to the audit department forthwith and granted an additional three weeks for the submission of the report.

The court was considering a report submitted by the Sabarimala special commissioner based on a devaswom vigilance report alleging that Rs 5.15 lakh had been misappropriated by temple administrative officials in connection with the purchase of materials for conducting Ashtabhishekam during the last six Masapooja occasions. Accordingly, HC had directed the audit department to conduct an audit and submit a report.

In its previous order, HC had also directed TDB to furnish details of top-level officers who had faced disciplinary proceedings during their service or had received adverse remarks either from the court or the board at any point in time. On Friday, TDB’s standing counsel submitted that the statement was being filed. Accordingly, HC adjourned the petition to June 3 for perusal of the statement.

In another order, the division bench extended the tenure of Sabarimala special commissioner R Jayakrishnan by two years from June 30, as his current tenure is set to end on June 29.