Thiruvananthapuram: The amicus curiae for Sree Padmanabha Swamy temple, Gopal Subramaniam, will reach here on August 29 for a two-day visit to hold consultations with the erstwhile Travancore royal family on the opening of Vault B. The erstwhile royals had objected to the opening of Vault B, the only underground chamber of Sree Padmanabha Swamy temple that has not been examined officially. The family had invoked the wrath of the gods but had said that they would go by the decision of the temple tantri.
When the royals had submitted their reservation to the apex court on July 4, the court had directed the amicus curiae to report back after thrashing out a consensus. A top temple source said that Mr Subramaniam would hold discussions with all stakeholders including the royals, the tantri, and representatives of devotees on August 30. The amicus curiae will also be present when the expert committee documenting the temple treasures would examine the deity on August 30.
The royal family had argued that the ‘devaprashnam’ in 2011 had quite unambiguously stated that the chamber should not be opened. It was also said that the chamber was deeply connected to the ‘sreekovil’. Certain machinery, levers and pulleys, connected to the functioning of the temple, were right under the B vault, it was argued. To further press home the futility of opening the B chamber, it was also said that the chamber was locked from the inside.
The counter argument was that historical records and recent intervention had led to the opening of the chamber before. Former CAG Mr Vinod Rai, in his report, had stated that the chamber was opened seven times between 1982 and 2002. But representatives of the royal family brush aside the claim as a mere fallacy.
According to them, whoever had entered had entered only the antechamber and not the actual chamber.
