Battle intensifies in Kerala for Hindu temple’s $22 billion treasure
A $22 billion treasure trove unearthed beneath Kerala’s Padmanabhaswamy Temple has sparked a fierce political and public debate over ownership and how best to put the vast wealth to use. The vaults of the 16th century temple were prised open for the first time in June, since when public calls have grown for redistribution of the wealth to the poor.
Discovered in the vaults were a dazzling stash of gold ornaments, Napoleonic era coins and sacks of gemstones. The archaeological find, one of the greatest ever made in India, has triggered a fierce legal battle for custodianship, pitting the royal family of Travancore, which controls the temple, against the Kerala High Court that has asked the state government to bring the temple under a public trust.
The 500-year-old temple, dedicated to Lord Vishnu, is unique in terms of architecture and mythology, with legends of a curse protecting the long-hidden treasure.
While the royal family’s guardianship of the temple’s wealth over close to three centuries has drawn plaudits, critics say the fortune could go far to stimulate Kerala’s local economy and improve living standards in a country with an estimated 450 million people living in poverty. “The royal family had a great tradition of being progressive and it had been an integral part of the history and traditions of the temple. It would not be right to deny them any role in the temple’s affairs,” said Ramesh Chennithala, chief of the Kerala unit of the ruling Congress party.
Read the full story by D Jose here.
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Huge treasure trove discovered under southern Indian Hindu temple
Investigators plan to pry open the final vault hidden deep under a centuries-old Indian Hindu temple as police guarded round the clock the shrine where billions of dollars worth of treasure has been discovered. Over the last week a seven-member team of investigators has broken into five of the six secret subterranean vaults piled high with jewels that have lain untouched for hundreds of years.
Onlookers and devotees thronged the shrine in the bustling centre of Thiruvananthapuram, the capital of India’s southern Kerala state, as officials said treasure worth more than $20 billion had been found — more than India’s education budget. Sacks filled with diamonds were piled next to tonnes of gold coins and jewellery, media reported, in the vaults of the 16th century Sree Padmanabhaswamy temple, the royal chapel of the former rulers of Travancore, now part of Kerala state.
“The current market value of the articles found so far by the committee members would be roughly 900 billion rupees,” one temple official who was not authorised to speak to the media told Reuters. Investigators searched the vaults to draw up an inventory of the riches because of worry about security but they had no idea of the amount of treasure they would find.
“We are ready to protect the temple wealth. We will chart out measures for the permanent security in consultation with the Travancore Royal family, which administers the temple now, and the chief priest of the temple”, state Chief Minister Oommen Chandy told reporters.
Historians supported the estimates of the treasure’s value, noting the lucrative trade routes that passed through the region for many centuries. “Traders, who used to come from other parts of the country and abroad for buying spices and other commodities, used to make handsome offerings to the deity for not only his blessings but also to please the then rulers”, said P.J. Cherian, director of Kerala Council for Historic Research.
Read the full story by D Jose here. See also Treasure trove found in Kerala temple, said to be worth billions.
100 pilgrims killed in stampede at Hindu festival in India
A stampede sparked by a night-time road accident in dense forest has killed more than 100 Hindu pilgrims in the southern state of Kerala in India. Kerala’s deputy general of police told reporters that 102 people who visited the Sabarimala Temple to offer prayers to the Hindu deity Ayappa had been killed on Friday night. Officials at a Hindu temple estimated the death toll at around 100, Kerala Temple Affairs Minister Ramachandran Kadannappally said by telephone.
Hundreds of thousands had gathered at the hilltop shrine of Sabarimala on Friday evening, the last day of an annual two-month religious festival. A bus carrying pilgrims back to the neighbouring state of Karnataka collided with a jeep and went out of control, crushing people walking nearby, Kadannappally said. Panicked pilgrims rushed forward, triggering a stampede.
“They came down the hillside… this happened primarily because the area was totally dark,” Jacob Punnoose, Kerala Deputy General of Police told Times Now TV channel.
Fifty-two pilgrims were killed in an almost identical stampede at Sabarimala in 1999. An investigation into the deaths found the state government guilty of negligence in ensuring public safety.
from India Insight:
Can you outsource God?
– Saritha Rai writes for the GlobalPost, where this article first appeared. –
It is dawn in Kerala, a palm frond of a state in India's South West. As the sun's first rays hit the church steeple, a Holy Mass is being conducted in the local Malayalam language.
Only, the prayer is dedicated to a newborn by his Catholic family half a world away in the United States.
Requests for these so-called Mass Intentions, or prayers offered for a specific reason, pour into India from the United States, Canada and Europe, where there is a huge shortage of priests.
This outsourcing to faraway India is a quaint practice that has been called "religious outsourcing."
But now, the severe global economic crisis and bankruptcies in Western churches are hitting even this unusual practice. In Kerala and other parts of India, where the Roman Catholic Church still thrives, outsourced mass intentions are dwindling and striking the income of poorer priests and impoverished churches.
Sebastian Adayanthrath, bishop of Kerala's Ernakulam-Angamaly archdiocese, one of the oldest in the country, said he is observing a big slowdown in incoming requests for mass intentions from the West.
Ex-nun urges Indian Catholic Church reform in tell-all book
A Roman Catholic nun who left her convent in India after 33 years of service has penned an unflattering picture of life within the cloistered walls in a book that may further embarrass the Church.
In “Amen: The Autobiography of a Nun”, published in India in English this month, Sister Jesme tells of sexual relations between some priests and nuns, homosexuality in the convent and discrimination and corruption in Catholic institutions…
“Amen” grabbed media headlines in February, when it was first published in Malayalam — the regional language of Kerala. With the new English edition and offers of a film based on the book, Sister Jesme’s plea for a reformation of the Church is now set to reach a wider audience.
Reading Tom Heneghan’s article on the French monks killed in Algeria brought me right back to Charles Foucault.
from India Insight:
How thin a line between Church and State?
Catholic churchgoers in Kerala will soon receive, in addition to the communion, an appeal to not vote for atheists.
The Kerala Catholic Bishops Council has issued a pastoral letter to be read out in Catholic churches from Sunday, urging parishioners to vote for those who uphold secularism and fight terrorism, according to a report in the Indian Express paper.
The church is also keen that people vote for politicians who will fight against euthanasia and abortion, a direct response to the Left-ruled state's law reforms commission, which favours legalising euthanasia and floating a public trust to run church properties.
The communists have long been at loggerheads with the Catholic church on matters related to religion and education, including how church-run educational institutions -- mostly profitable -- should be run.
Kerala's Cardinal Varkey Vithayathil, head of the Catholic Bishops Conference of India, an association of Catholic bishops, went one step further, reportedly calling the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party the "lesser evil" to the state's Marxists.
Critics of the church say it has no business meddling in affairs of the state -- or telling people whom they should vote for -- and that the issue is really about money and diverting attention from its own troubles.
Supporters of the church -- and the outspoken cardinal -- say Christians in India are under attack and it is only fair that the church look out for itself and its people.
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Resident FaithWorld Expert
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First of all, the report is false in some aspects.
There was no undearthing of treasure-troves.
It was mere opening of the vaults of the temple for an inventory to be preapred under court-order, a rich temple,a temple with a deity who was once the nominal head of the State and on whose behalf the Kings ruled.Offerings are made at temples and in the course of its 2000 year history,the vaults have become quite rich.
Some of the items are used daily for the temple service and hence those vaults are opened daily for the purpose.They themselves are vaulable artifacts,infact the temple idol is itself gold and would we think of valuing it and selling it off through sotheby’s? but they have a sanctity associated with them infact most of the items do,as they were offerings.
Legally all items belong to the temple and the royal family has the custodianship which of course does not mean the right to do away with it.
This is a within-temple matter and the court had ordered the inventory for mere documentation purpose and in order to prevent any mismanagement within the organisation.
There is infact no need for anyone to suggest or demand how the ”spoils” should be divided!