HC orders to register case on 475gms of missing Sabarimala gold, wants police chief to be made a party, seeks report in 6 weeks

Kochi: The Kerala High Court has observed that approximately 475 grams of gold are missing from the gold-plated panels at Sabarimala. The observation came after reviewing the Devaswom Vigilance report submitted to the court in connection with the Sabarimala gold plate case.

The court directed that a fair and impartial investigation be conducted into the Vigilance findings and ordered that the State Police Chief be impleaded as a party in the case. It further instructed that a case be registered and the investigation be handed over to a Special Investigation Team (SIT). The directive came from the Devaswom Division Bench, comprising Justices Raja Vijayaraghavan and K V Jayachandran.

The Devaswom Vigilance report will be handed over to the Devaswom Board, which in turn must forward it to the State Police Chief. Based on his recommendation, a special team must register a case and begin the investigation, the court stated.

The court also instructed that the progress of the investigation be submitted every two weeks in sealed covers and that a detailed report be filed within six weeks. All relevant documents must also be submitted to the court. The SIT has been issued further instructions, and it is expected that an FIR will be registered without delay.

The Vigilance report was submitted by SP Sunilkumar and contains crucial revelations regarding the case. It claims the gold-plated panels removed from Sabarimala were sold in Bengaluru for crores of rupees, reportedly to eliminate the astrological affliction Shani Dosha and for wealth-related rituals.

According to the report, the gold was handed over to Unnikrishnan Potti for plating on the instructions of the Devaswom Commissioner. The official records described the items as copper plates, not gold-plated ones. However, when the artefacts reached Smart Creations, the firm involved, gold plating was visibly present, pointing to potential irregularities.

It is now alleged that gold was stripped from the panels at Smart Creations. The court stated that the act of recording gold-plated copper plates as mere copper and handing them over to Unnikrishnan Potti was highly suspicious and grave.

SP Shashidhar from the Special Investigation Team also appeared before the court. The court's intervention came amid ongoing controversies surrounding Sabarimala. It added that the SIT could determine whether separate cases should be registered for different incidents.

In a new development, the court included the Director General of Police (DGP) as a party to the proceedings. It was also revealed that during the time of the alleged gold tampering, then Vigilance SP P Bijoy was not informed of these developments. He has now been included in the new investigation team.

The Vigilance Department had earlier collected statements from Unnikrishnan Potti and Smart Creations. The report points to the Devaswom Board’s responsibility in the case. However, as the report is classified, further details are unlikely to be made public.

An additional angle under scrutiny is whether the gold donated by industrialist Vijay Mallya was substituted with copper during plating.

Given the controversy, the High Court had earlier instructed authorities to conduct a full inventory of all valuable items at Sabarimala. Amicus Curiae K T Sankaran will visit the shrine as part of this process, and the court has asked the media to report on the visit.