The Ayodhya Ram temple in Uttar Pradesh is in the headlines after the state government ordered a probe into the alleged embezzlement of donations, including cash and other valuables. On June 26, the Special Investigation Team (SIT) arrested eight people in connection with the case. It is alleged that nearly ₹7.5 crore in donations made to the popular Hindu shrine had been stolen or embezzled.
The case also triggered a political controversy in India, with opposition parties attacking the BJP-led government in Uttar Pradesh as well as the Union government.
As the probe team started uncovering details linked to the theft allegations, two members of the Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teerth Kshetra Trust, which manages the temple, resigned from their posts. Trust General Secretary Champat Rai and member Anil Mishra reportedly tendered their resignations on June 27.
Missing crown and insider tip-off
The allegations of theft first surfaced on social media on June 7, 2026. Following this, Samajwadi Party national president Akhilesh Yadav alleged that crores of rupees from donations offered at the Ram temple had gone missing. However, Trust General Secretary Champat Rai dismissed the allegations and welcomed a probe.
In an interview with online news platform Rediff, Samajwadi Party leader Tej Narayan Pandey alias Pawan Pandey, who first raised the fund embezzlement allegations, revealed that he was informed about the irregularities by insiders and former employees of the temple. He claimed that an accountant in charge told him the temple never kept records of the money received as donations. He added that Ram Lalla's crown and necklace had also gone missing from the temple. Around 200 silver bricks donated by devotees had also disappeared, he claimed. He argued that the alleged theft came to light after employees who were dissatisfied with their share tipped him off about the alleged crime.
PIL in Allahabad High Court
On June 12, advocate Mohit Ashok moved a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) in the Allahabad High Court, seeking an independent, credible and time-bound probe into the alleged fund embezzlement. The petitioner also requested the court to direct the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to conduct a thorough probe into the alleged theft as well as the district administration's role in the Ram temple project. Amid this, on June 13, the Uttar Pradesh government constituted a Special Investigation Team to probe the allegations.
The probe
The SIT submitted its preliminary report to the Uttar Pradesh government on June 23. The three-member team, led by Vijay Vishwas Pant, Commissioner of the Lucknow Division, named 17 people as accused in the case.
According to Ayodhya police, the case was registered based on a complaint filed by Krishna Mohan, a member of the Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teerth Kshetra Trust.
On June 26, the police arrested eight people named in the FIR. The accused—Avinash Shukla, Anukalp Mishra, Lavkush Mishra, Manish Kumar Yadav, Karunesh Pandey, Ramashankar Mishra, Subhash Srivastava and Ramshankar Yadav alias Tinnu—were associated with the process of counting cash and valuables received as donations at the temple. All eight accused were remanded to judicial custody till June 29.
Prosecution officer KC Verma said five to six of the arrested persons were bank employees who had been deployed to count cash donations received at the temple and were drawing salaries from the bank. He, however, declined to identify the individual bank employees at this stage of the investigation.
He said Tinnu Yadav was not a bank employee but worked as a driver to the trust secretary Champat Rai, while Subhash Srivastava was in charge of the donation counting process.
The case has been registered under Sections 306 (theft by clerk or servant of property in possession of master), 316 (criminal breach of trust), 317 (dishonestly receiving stolen property) and 61 (criminal conspiracy) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), among other penal provisions.
