HC adjourns TTD assets case

Hyderabad, Sept 14 :

HC adjourns TTD assets case to Thursday

The Andhra Pradesh High Court on Monday adjourned to Thursday the case pertaining to assets of the world famous Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams (TTD). The case was filed before the court by Mr Bezawada Govinda Reddy, an advocate and a senior congress leader from Nellore district. In his petition he alleged that the valuable jewellery was being misappropriated and there was no accountability.

Before adjourning the case, a division bench of the High Court comprising justice Justice G. Raghuram and Justice Ramesh Ranganathan directed the TTD to place an inventory of the entire jewellery of Tirumala and other temples before the court along with the statement as to the conformity of the list with the physical verification done.

The court also directed the Executive Officer of the TTD, Mr I Y R Krishna Rao, to give an undertaking that the TTD would submit a comprehensive inventory of jewellery indicating the value in addition to the status of movable and immovable properties of the Devasthanams in two months.

The court ordered the executive officer spell out clearly the reasons ‘structural or otherwise for failure to ensure annual verification and audit of entirety of assets of temples’ is to be submitted along with the inventory.

The Bench sought a master list of the entire gold and silver jewellery and other articles used for ‘pooja’, pertaining to all temples under the control of the TTD, to be placed before the court. It also wanted the report of verification and enumeration of purity, weight and cartage of the items in the master list to be authenticated by the Executive Officer of the TTD.