Kerala BJP President Rajeev Chandrashekar accused both the Congress and CPI (M) in the state of looting from the people in the backdrop of the ongoing Sabarimala gold theft row.
" Cong and CPM have for decades in Kerala, looted from poor, from business, from farmers, from SC/St schemes and list is non-stop. Now its coming out that their corruption doesnt stop even in temples and devaswoms boards. #Unforgivable. I say again - Cong and CPM are twins, united by their corruption and exploitation," mentioned a tweet by the minister on X (formerly Twitter).
He even questioned why both the Congress and the left government have not allowed temples to be managed by the devotees.
" If this loot is happening in Sabarimala, then an important question is how many other temples are being looted and hubs of political corruption ?" the minister pointed out.
What is the Sabarimala gold theft controversy?
The row involves the Dwarapalaka idols and pedestals, which have been reported by the 2019 mahazars (inventories) as merely "copper plates". It was reported that they were gold-plated in 1999, using a portion of the gold and copper donated by industrialist Vijay Mallya.
The theft came to light during recent court proceedings, with documents revealing that the plates weighed 42.8 kg in 2019 (including gold cladding) but, upon return, showed a shortfall of 4.54 kg of gold after re-plating in the same year by a sponsor named Unnikrishnan Potty.
However, as the controversy intensified, Advocate K.B. Pradeep, representing Smart Creations — the Chennai-based firm where the re-plating took place in 2019 — stated that the Dwarapalaka plate sent to the company that year was not gold-plated but entirely made of copper.