The State Information Commission recently fined S K Chatterjee of the SJTA for failing to share information in the public interest.
The mystery surrounding Lord Jagannath’s ‘Ratna Bhandar’ has deepened, according to devotees, as the Odisha government has “no plan” to reopen the inner chamber of the treasury of the 12th-century shrine in Puri and has refused to share information about the temple’s asset with an RTI activist.
The Shree Jagannath Temple Administration (SJTA), which is part of the state law department, did not respond to questions from Bolangir-based RTI activist Hemant Panda.
The State Information Commission recently fined S K Chatterjee of the SJTA for failing to share information in the public interest.
Temple administrator (development) Ajay Kumar Jena stated that the SJTA cannot decide to open the inner chamber of the ‘Ratna Bhandar’ and that the issue will be brought before the Sri Jagannath Temple Managing Committee at its next meeting.
“The SJTA will inform the government of the decision of the managing committee, and then only the treasury can be opened,” he said.
Water appeared to seep through cracks in the store’s wall, according to temple’s ‘Ratna Bhandar’ in-charge and servitor Niranjan Mekap, who added that the treasury “must be opened immediately and repaired.”
Jaynarayan Mishra, the state assembly’s leader of the opposition, claimed that the state government has “never made any attempt to open the inner chamber of the treasury despite the fact that it contains gold, diamond jewellery, precious stones, and other ornaments.”
The Sri Jagannath Temple Act of 1955 requires inspection of the ‘Ratna Bhandar’ every three years, but it has remained closed for 44 years, according to the BJP leader. The ruling BJD leaders have remained silent on the matter.
On July 16, Law Minister Jagannath Saraka told the Assembly that if a proposal to open the ‘Ratna Bhandar’ is received, the state government will take the necessary steps after considering various factors.
Members of the Congress and BJP in the House had demanded a “immediate inventory of items stored in the treasury.”
The titular king of Puri, Gajapati Maharaja Dibyasingha Deb, who is also the chairman of the Temple Managing Committee, has sought to open the treasury in order to dispel devotees’ concerns about the presence of assets.
The Archaeological Survey of India, which is in charge of maintaining Odisha’s most popular religious site, recently urged the state government to open the ‘Ratna Bhandar’ for physical inspection.
“The Ratna Bhandar is located in the temple’s basement, which should be physically inspected.
The treasury’s walls may be harmed as a result of the structure’s exposure to the elements.
It must be repaired as soon as possible “According to a senior ASI official.
The temple’s treasury has at least two chambers. According to temple sources, the treasury’s ‘Bahar Bhandar’ (outer chamber) houses ornaments used by the deities on a daily basis, while the inner chamber houses many pieces of jewellery.
Following an Orissa High Court directive, an attempt was made to open the inner chamber of ‘Ratna Bhandar’ in April 2018, but it was unsuccessful because keys were not found at the time.
A team of ASI officials, priests, and others then conducted an outside inspection.
Following widespread outrage, Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik established a judicial commission led by retired Justice Raghubir Das to investigate the missing key issue.
“Although the commission has submitted its report to the state government, we are baffled as to why the panel’s findings have yet to be tabled in the assembly,” senior Congress legislator Santosh Singh Saluja said.
The commission submitted its 324-page report to the Odisha government in November 2018.
According to the opposition MLA, the “missing of the ‘Ratna Bhandar’ keys and the government’s refusal to reveal the judicial panel report has created a mystique.”
Former temple administrator Rabindra Narayan Mishra, who was part of the team that inspected the treasury’s inner chamber in 1978, stated, “The Ratna Bhandar is divided into two sections. The outer chamber houses the deities’ ornaments and valuables, while the inner chamber houses the majority of their precious jewellery. I’d seen huge amounts of gold, diamonds, and ornaments wrapped in clothes and stored in wooden boxes.”
Previously, the ‘Ratna Bhandar’ was established in 1803 and 1926, according to Mishra.
During the last inspection, all the precious items were properly listed and weighed, he said, adding that the asset’s valuation could not be determined because goldsmiths from Tamil Nadu and Gujarat were unable to calculate.
During the last inspection, all the precious items were properly listed and weighed, he said, adding that the asset’s valuation could not be determined because goldsmiths from Tamil Nadu and Gujarat were unable to calculate the actual value of the ornaments at the time.
“I believe it is past time to inventory the ornaments stored in the Ratna Bhandar and allow the ASI to inspect the temple’s physical structure,” he said.
In 2021, then-law minister Pratap Jena informed the House that the ‘Ratna Bhandar’ contained 12,831 ‘bhari’ of gold and 22,153 ‘bhari’ of silver, according to a 1978 inventory (one bhari is equal to 11.66 grams).
He also stated that the treasury held 12,831 gramme of gold ornaments with precious stones and other valuables.
Jena stated that as much as 22,153 gramme of silver with expensive stones, silver utensils, and other valuables were discovered there, adding that 14 gold and silver items could not be weighed during the inventory process due to various reasons.
Prasanta Patnaik