Mumbai: Amid the hushed corridors and incense-laced air of the venerable shrine at Guruvayur Temple, where divine chants echo and devotees whisper their hopes, a disturbing tale of neglect has unfurled. As per recent audit reports, the temple’s treasury of gold, silver, ivory and other precious offerings has drifted into a realm of uncertainty, exposing a sacred trust that now trembles under the weight of lax governance.
The temple’s treasures once gleamed under the watchful eyes of devotees and priests alike — gold crowns, silver bells, bronze vessels, elephant tusks shimmering in ivory-white splendour. Yet, the latest examinations by the state audit department reveal that this radiance was no guarantee of accountability. For the years 2019-20 and 2020-21, financial scrutiny uncovered that the temple’s management, the Guruvayur Devaswom, had allowed the sacred bounty to slip into murky waters of missing documentation, unchecked custody and unexplained transformations, as per a Times of India news report.
At the heart of the audit’s concerns lies the handling of ivory. According to the report, some 522.86 kg of ivory — from trimmed tusks to ivory chips- was recorded in 2019-20. None of this was handed over to the forest department as required by law. The breakdown of removal dates is chilling: 505 kg on 26 Sep 2019; 14.18 kg on 19 Sep; 2.35 kg from the prior year; 730 gm and 320 gm in April and July, respectively; 280 gm in late July. Even the mahazar (seizure memo) or handover slips were missing. As one audit remark stated, the board was directed to furnish details within ten days, and yet neither the information came, nor the ivory was sent out.
Inside the very sanctum where rituals originate, the double-lock register used to track gold and silver articles revealed further anomalies. Vessels once weighed, then returned lighter. A silver pot shed 1.19 kg in ten months; a lamp arrived back noticeably lighter. In one striking case, a gold crown vanished, replaced by a silver ornament. A silver vessel weighing 2.65 kg was substituted for one at 750 gm. Yet curiosity barely stirred. No formal inquiry followed.
Beyond tusks and treasured metals, the audit uncovered the disappearance of 17 sacks filled with manjadikuru (red lucky seeds) offered by devotees, stored in the western tower. Auctioned at ₹100 per kg, they were never collected by the winning bidder; yet CCTV footage showed them loaded onto the devaswom tractor by health-department workers. Their ultimate fate? Lost to the official record.
It emerges that large donations of copper, bronze, and panchaloha items have not been properly accounted for since 2016. One devotee in 2022 offered a four-eared bronze vessel weighing two tonnes and valued at around ₹15 lakh; it was neither issued a receipt, nor entered in any register, nor assigned custody. Meanwhile, saffron, Kashmiri saffron, at ₹1.47 lakh per kg, offered by devotees, is added only to a personal register, bypassing official audit systems.
The audit also points out that the legal mandate under the Guruvayur Devaswom Act, 1978 and Rules 1980, requires an annual physical verification of all valuables. No such verification has been carried out in over four decades. The 2020-21 audit confirmed that this was no isolated oversight but part of a systemically entrenched laxity.
When approached, chairman V K Vijayan clarified that these concerns pertained to a period before the current board took office and asserted that since 2022, internal controls have been reinforced. He claimed that all offerings, including gold and silver, are now properly recorded and maintained in line with audit requirements.
Yet the accumulation of years of neglect cannot be erased overnight: the audit’s findings form a litany of lost chance, of desirable treasures slipping through unseen cracks. What was once fastened by locks of devotion and faith now floats in registers of ambiguity. The shrine remains resplendent, its rituals untouched, but within its storerooms and record-books lies a cautionary tale of sacred wealth left unchecked.
Perhaps for devotees, the spiritual sanctuary remains untainted. Yet for the custodians of that trust, the message is clear: treasures of divine origin demand vigilance of human custodianship, and without it even the most sacred of halls may harbour silent shadows where wealth wanders and faith watches.
In the temple’s echoing halls, as bells ring and incense rises, let this chapter be a solemn reminder: safeguarding the gifts of devotion is as sacred as the offering itself — for in their care lies the true reflection of reverence.
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Photo: IANS
