SIT Arrests Former TDB Administrative Officer Murari Babu
Babu, who was suspended by the Travancore Devaswom Board (TDB) following the gold missing row, was taken into custody from his residence in Changanassery on Wednesday night, they said.
Pathanamthitta: The Special Investigation Team (SIT) probing the Sabarimala temple gold scam has arrested Murari Babu, the former Travancore Devaswom Board (TDB) administrative officer.
Murari Babu, the second accused in the case, was taken into custody by the SIT from his residence in Perunna on Wednesday night. The TDB had already suspended him from his position.
While serving as the Administrative Officer, Babu allegedly listed the Sabarimala Temple's gold-clad Dwarapalaka plates as "copper plates" in official records before sending them for repair to Smart Creations in Chennai through the first accused , Unnikrishnan Potty. After the controversy arose, Babu claimed he recorded them as "copper" because it was used as the base metal.
The High Court, overseeing the probe, reviewed the preliminary report submitted by the SIT on Tuesday. The court further directed the SIT to conduct a comprehensive investigation, as significant damage and loss of gold plating on the Dwarapalakas were discovered in 2024.
The court expressed doubts about whether the Dwarapalakas returned to the temple were the same ones entrusted in 2019.
The High Court observed that all Devaswom Officers were responsible for failing to weigh and record the idols during refixation and suspected that the 2025 re-entrustment was intended to cover up the 2019 pilferage. The court referred to Potty as a person with "dubious antecedents" and held that the officials had willfully concealed the irregularities. The next hearing is scheduled for November 5.
The High Court has directed the SIT not to limit its probe to the Dwarapalakas and side frames alone, but to uncover the larger conspiracy and identify the TDB officials who may have colluded to conceal the misappropriation of gold from the gold-clad plates.
The SIT is investigating alleged irregularities related to the reduction in the weight of gold-clad copper coverings of the Dwarapalaka idols at the Sabarimala temple.
The preliminary report was submitted in a sealed cover by the SIT chief, S Sasidharan. The case was heard in camera by a Division Bench comprising Justice Raja Vijayaraghavan V and K V Jayakumar.
It may be recalled that the remand report submitted by the SIT in Judicial First Class Magistrate Court - 1, Ranni, stated that Potty manipulated Mahazar records to show gold-clad panels as copper and had them handed over to others in 2019 while he was absent. The documents had the signatures of his friends Ananthasubrahmanyam and Ramesh.
Potty, who worked as an assistant priest at Sabarimala between 2004 and 2008, misappropriated gold under the guise of cladding the copper panels of the Dwarapalaka idols, despite being aware that the work had already been completed in 1998.
The report states that Potty procured about two kilograms of gold through "illicit means, breach of trust and cheating" for monetary gain.
The SIT probe has also placed Devaswom Board officials under scrutiny. It was found that the TDB officials who signed the Mahazar to transport the panels to Chennai for gold plating in 2019 were aware that the idols had already been gold-plated earlier.
Potty was arrested on Thursday by the SIT from his residence in Pulimath in Thiruvananthapuram district.
