The investigation into the alleged theft of donations at the Ram temple in Ayodhya has reached a key stage with the chargesheet likely to be filed by the month-end, said a police official who is part of the probe team.
The focus is now on cross-verifying all evidence. Police have mapped these movements with duty charts, cash handling registers and statements of staff. A second SIT was constituted in July following the Supreme Court’s direction for an IPS-led investigation. The second SIT is headed by inspector general of police (Lucknow range) Kiran S and includes deputy inspector general (Ayodhya range) Somen Barma, Ayodhya senior superintendent of police Gaurav Grover and additional superintendent of police (Barabanki) Ritesh Kumar Singh. However, it found no evidence of financial impropriety at the leadership level. The report exonerated former Champat Rai and trustee Anil Mishra, stating that there was no evidence of their direct involvement in the alleged misappropriation of donation money.
The donation theft controversy first surfaced on June 7 when Samajwadi Party leader Tej Narayan ‘Pawan’ Pandey alleged that donations worth ₹ 5 crore to ₹ 7.5 crore were siphoned off from temple offerings. On June 13, the state government set up the first SIT comprising Lucknow divisional commissioner Vijay Vishwas Pant, inspector general of police (Lucknow range) Kiran S and special secretary (finance) Neel Ratan. All eight accused named in the FIR — Anukalp Mishra, Lavkush Mishra, Ram Shankar Yadav alias Tinnu, Manish Yadav, Subhash Srivastava, Avinash Shukla, Rama Shankar Mishra and Karunesh Pandey — were arrested on June 26.
Police claim to have gathered sufficient evidence to substantiate charges against all eight arrested accused, the official privy to the probe said. On August 17, the first SIT’s final report flagged “gross lapses” in the functioning of the trust and the lack of professional financial management in the Trust.
Initial investigation, after scanning CCTV footage of the temple premises, revealed activities of hiding or siphoning off offerings more than 70 times between April 27 and June 5.
Police sources said the case diary includes detailed inventory of seized articles, forensic examination of digital evidence including DVR recordings, UPI logs and bank transactions, and statements of temple staff and trust officials.
