Foreign News
Row over alleged theft of donations from India’s landmark Ram temple
Two-and-a-half years after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated a grand temple to Hindu god Ram, the shrine is embroiled in an unsavoury row over allegations that donations from devotees worth tens of millions of rupees have been embezzled.
The temple in the once-flashpoint city of Ayodhya in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh replaced a 16th-Century mosque torn down by Hindu mobs in 1992, sparking riots in which nearly 2,000 people died.
Since its inauguration in January 2024, the three-storey temple spread over 2.7 acres has become one of India’s most important pilgrimage centres, attracting an estimated 50 million visitors annually.
But in recent weeks, questions over the handling of cash, valuable jewellery, gold and silver offered by devotees have triggered a political controversy and petitions have been filed in the Supreme Court seeking a court-monitored investigation by the federal police.
The Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teerth Kshetra Trust – an independent trust which manages the shrine – has denied any wrongdoing. The state government has set up a three-member Special Investigation Team (SIT) to inquire into the allegations.
Following an interim report from SIT, Ayodhya police registered a case of alleged embezzlement on Thursday, naming eight people.
All eight are in custody and being questioned, senior police officer Gaurav Grover told BBC Hindi. They are expected to be produced before a magistrate within a day or two, he added.
The temple complex, which also includes six smaller shrines, draws 70,000 to 80,000 devotees daily, with crowds tripling on weekends and festivals. Most leave offerings in about 35 donation boxes around the site.
The trust – which collects, sorts and counts the offerings – recorded an annual income of 3.27bn rupees ($35m; £26m) in the financial year 2024-25, making it one of India’s largest temples in terms of earnings, the Hindustan Times reported.
A former city legislator has alleged more than 70m rupees ($739,550; £560,420) have gone missing.
The temple trust rejected claims that donations or offerings were improperly handled.
In a video statement on Facebook, its general secretary Champat Rai said the trust’s activities, including the process used to count donations and even the counting room, were routinely audited by their trustees and workers along with some State Bank of India employees.
“This work continues for several days. This is what is happening nowadays. No-one has noticed any discrepancy yet,” he added.
The allegations of embezzlement at what is considered one of India’s most consequential religious sites has made headlines in India. The temple stands on a site that has been at the centre of one of India’s most consequential religious, political and legal disputes for decades.
Many Hindus believe Ayodhya to be the birthplace of deity Ram. A vigorous nation-wide campaign spearheaded by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to reclaim the land led to the demolition of the Babri mosque by Hindu activists in 1992.
After a long legal battle, the Supreme Court in 2019 awarded the disputed land for the construction of a temple and ordered that alternative land be provided for a mosque.
The dispute shaped Indian politics for decades and became closely associated with the rise of the BJP in the 1990s in a country where 80% of the population is Hindu.
The construction of the temple was one of the main election promises of the BJP and its opening in January 2024 is believed to have contributed to Modi’s win in the general election held a few months later.
So even though the temple is managed by an independent trust, opposition parties are demanding answers from Modi and his BJP – which is also in power in the state.
The alleged irregularities in the handling of donations and offerings made by devotees were first made by Mahipal Singh, who previously supervised the trust’s accounts team and is now being called the “whistleblower”.
Singh has publicly claimed that he was replaced after he raised concerns internally about the handling of cash offerings and precious metals received as gifts. When contacted by BBC Hindi, Singh refused to talk citing threat to his life.
“I have received death threats. I am under immense pressure and stress. I am not in a position to say anything. Whatever I have said in public so far, please accept it as my word,” he said.
The concerns raised by Singh have not been independently verified, but the issue gained political attention on 7 June when former state chief minister and Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav raised questions about the alleged siphoning off of donations and called for an investigation.
In a series of social media posts, he demanded explanations from those managing donations and questioned what he described as a lack of clarity over the matter.
His party colleague Ayodhya MP Awadhesh Prasad said the matter should be investigated by a court-monitored team. He also called for trust members to be suspended from their positions while any inquiry is under way.
Several other politicians – from the opposition as well as the BJP – also raised questions about the alleged financial irregularities.
Local BJP leader Rajneesh Singh sought an investigation into issues linked to donations and the people involved in managing them.
Meanwhile, the long-time residents of Ayodhya told BBC Hindi that they were shocked by the allegations of corruption at the temple.
“The offerings are meant for the temple’s upkeep and for the welfare of pilgrims. It’s not meant for people to take home,” said Vijay Lakshmi.
Santosh Puri called the allegations “a fatal blow to our religion”.
Talking about the claims, Ajay Kumar Varma described Ayodhya as “god’s abode” and said such things should not happen here. “The people being blamed have been involved with the temple for a long time, so it’s hard to believe that they could do this,” he said.
BP Pandey called the allegations “a stain” on the government and the trust. “The government must ensure that there is no repeat of this sort of thing.”
Meanwhile, the SIT has sought more time to complete the inquiry. Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath has urged anyone with evidence to submit it to investigators. He said the inquiry would establish the facts and appealed to devotees not to prejudge the outcome.
Adityanath added that people who had waited centuries for the construction of the Ram temple could wait a few more days for the SIT to complete its work.
But there’s a growing clamour to hand over the investigation to the federal police as it’s a matter involving one of India’s most prominent religious institutions.
A number of petitions have been filed in the state high court and the Supreme Court asking for a police complaint to be registered and judges to supervise the investigation.
A top court lawyer has also written a letter to the prime minister, the state chief minister and chief justice, seeking an investigation by the Central Bureau of Investigation “to restore the faith of the devotees”.
“These were not ordinary commercial receipts, but sacred offering,” he wrote. “Any diversion or embezzlement of funds constitutes a profound betrayal of the faith reposed by millions of devotees in one of the most sacred institutions of Hindu faith.”
[BBC]
Rescuers are rushing to locate dozens of people missing in the southwestern Chinese city of Chongqing, after a deadly landslide buried homes in the area, according to Chinese authorities.
The landslide took place around 9:10am (01:10 GMT) on Friday in Chongqing’s Pengshui county, killing eight people, leaving 34 unaccounted for and displacing more than 1,100, reported state media.
Footage shared by China’s CCTV broadcaster showed a huge buildup of rocks and dirt covering part of a residential and commercial street at the bottom of a mountain in the region.
Ten people have been rescued from the debris, including two who are seriously injured, reported China’s state-run Xinhua news agency.
Water, electricity and gas supplies were cut off within a one-kilometre (0.6-mile) radius of the landslide to prevent further disruptions. More than 800 rescuers have gone to the site, reported CCTV.
Authorities said they sent more than 8,000 disaster relief items to Chongqing, including tents, folding beds and family emergency kits.
Pengshui county is located in the southeast part of Chongqing, bordering the provinces of Hubei and Guizhou.
The area where the landslide happened is known for “unpredictable” steep terrain, a local official told a news conference, adding that dangerous rocks remain along the sides of the cliff.
The government has allocated 50 million yuan ($7.36m) in natural disaster relief funds to support the rescue and relief operations and to provide assistance to affected residents, the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Emergency Management said.
[Aljazeera]
Almost 5,000 people are known to have died in two earthquakes that devastated Venezuela in June, but the United Nations estimates that as many as 50,000 people may still be missing – with many feared buried under rubble.
The number of confirmed deaths is now higher at 4,930, lawmaker Jorge Rodriguez announced on Thursday
The disaster almost a month ago impacted tens of thousands of others. Nearly 17,000 people are wounded, and 21,120 are living in shelters.
Venezuelan teams have been operating since the earthquake struck, but locals say their response has been slow.
“From the very first moment, from when the earthquake happened, there was an immediate response, but from civilians. Civilians and independent people. The state’s response is only being seen now,” Cinthia Pulido, a Venezuelan displaced by the earthquakes, told Al Jazeera. “We’re watching and waiting for some kind of answer.”
International rescue teams sent in the immediate aftermath of the disaster have left as the focus moves to providing humanitarian relief.
“The little I can get is just for me to survive, support my children, and help my mum,” Louismarez Paez, who has also been displaced, told Al Jazeera.
Her mother, she said, does not receive any assistance other than that which she herself provides.
Venezuela has ‘crucial resources’ it cannot access
Venezuela has faced tight US sanctions since 2015, which experts say is making the government’s job even harder.
“Venezuela has crucial resources that it is not being allowed to access,” Mark Weisbrot, senior economist and co-director at the Center for Economic and Policy Research, said.
That includes $11bn blocked by the US and European countries that Venezuela “should legally have”, Weisbrot said.
Earlier this week, a group of 14 Democratic lawmakers in the US sent a letter urging the White House to ease economic sanctions on Venezuela to aid recovery efforts, according to a report from Spanish newspaper El Pais.
The sanctions, they wrote, are “severely hampering urgent relief efforts” and have “severely undermined the country’s response and reconstruction efforts”.
The UN estimates that the recovery efforts in Venezuela could cost the country $37bn.
[Aljazeera]
Argentina face the prospect of a Fifa fine after their players celebrated the World Cup semi-final win against England with a banner in support of their country’s claims to the Falkland Islands.
The defending world champions produced a dramatic late comeback in Atlanta, scoring twice to defeat Thomas Tuchel’s side 2-1 and book a showdown with Spain in Sunday’s final.
After the final whistle, Argentina players celebrated while holding a banner reading “Las Malvinas son Argentinas”, which translates as “The Falklands are Argentine”.
The Falkland Islands, a British overseas territory in the south-west Atlantic Ocean, remain the subject of a sovereignty dispute between Britain and Argentina.
The two nations went to war over the group of islands, situated 300 miles off Argentina’s east coast, from April to June 1982.
The 74-day conflict led to the deaths of 655 Argentine and 255 British servicemen. Three people from the islands also died.
In 2014, Fifa fined the Argentine Football Association 20,000 pounds after its players held up a banner with the same message before a friendly against Slovenia.
World football’s governing body said the gesture had breached rules on political action and team misconduct.
[BBC]
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