Sabarimala gold heist: SIT records third arrest

Thiruvananthapuram, Nov 1 In a major development in the Sabarimala gold theft case, the Special Investigation Team (SIT) has recorded the arrest of the temple's former Executive Officer Sudheesh Kumar, the third accused in the case.

Sudheesh Kumar was questioned at the Crime Branch office in Enchakkal, Thiruvananthapuram, from Thursday evening, before his arrest was formally recorded late on Friday.

He was scheduled to be produced before the Ranni court later on Saturday.

The Kerala High Court had, last month, constituted the SIT and gave them six weeks' time to complete the probe.

As the first step, the SIT registered two separate FIRs and named 10 people as accused.

The first to go behind bars was the first accused – ‘sponsor’ Unnikrishnan Potti, and then it was the turn of former top Travancore Devasom Board officer Murari Babu.

Following several hours of questioning, Sudheesh Kumar was identified to have played a crucial role in facilitating the misappropriation of gold by recording the gold-plated Dwarapalaka panels as copper sheets and showing deliberate discrepancies in the 'mahazar' (seizure report).

The interrogation was led by SIT official Sashidharan.

Investigators concluded that this falsification allowed the main accused, Unnikrishnan Potti, to divert a portion of the temple’s gold with the help of Murari Babu.

The case dates back to 2019, when Kumar, then serving as Executive Officer at Sabarimala, recommended to the Travancore Devaswom Board that Unnikrishnan Potti be made a sponsor for the renovation work.

Despite knowing that the Dwarapalaka panels were gold-plated, he continued to list them as copper both in records and while removing the panels.

Though Potti did not personally receive the items, Kumar entered his name in the mahazar, a move investigators believe was intended to conceal irregularities.

The SIT on Friday questioned C.K. Vasudevan, Potti’s friend and intermediary, who allegedly stored the missing gold pedestal, but he was released after interrogation.

Vasudevan’s name also appears on Sabarimala’s list of sponsors.

The current Thiruvabharanam Commissioner, Raji Lal, was questioned earlier, as he had opposed transporting the panels this year.

In a key breakthrough, the SIT has seized crucial records from the Travancore Devaswom headquarters concerning the 1998 gold-plating work funded by industrialist Vijay Mallya.

These documents detail how much gold was used and in what form, information earlier reported as "unavailable" by temple officials.

The recovery of these records, investigators said, will help establish the exact quantity of gold applied to the idols and how much may have been misappropriated.

Now with three key alleged conspirators behind bars, the coming days will reveal if the political personalities named in the FIRs will be called in, as the SIT has to submit its detailed report on the progress of the probe before the High Court on Tuesday.

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