The Badrinath Kedarnath Temple Committee (BKTC) on Wednesday alleged Shankaracharya of Badrinath dham seat Avimukteshwaranand is carrying forward Congress party’s agenda through his allegation of missing gold from Kedarnath temple. Committee said it never purchased gold to lay it on the walls of the temple sanctum sanctorum.

BKTC has opposed the allegations labeled by the Shankaracharya Avimukteshwaranand that 228 kilograms of gold-plating was missing from the walls of Kedarnath shrine sanctum sanctorum.

He alleged that Avimukteshwaranand is trying to forge ahead the Congress party agenda with his baseless and uncalled for allegations.

“If Shankaracharya Avimukteshwaranand has evidence for his allegation he must produce and provide the same to the law enforcement and investigating agencies of the state and the centre. He must reach out to the court with his proofs and documents rather than sensationalising his allegations to carry forward the Congress Party’s agenda. We keep him in high esteem for the revered Sanatan seat and religious authority he holds but advocacy of the Congress party agenda on his part is not proper” alleged the BKTC chairman Ajeyendra Ajay.

BKTC chairman further demanded from Shankaracharya that if he has evidence of the gold theft from the temple he must file a PIL in the high court and demand a high level probe. He charged that a well planned conspiracy has been hatched to create controversy out of the gold platings of the Kedarnath Temple sanctum sanctorum.

BKTC chief clarified that the committee never purchased gold to plate Kedarnath temple walls.

“BKTC cleared the gold-plating proposal in its board meeting on the request of a donor. Entire gold plating task was carried out by the donor through his team of goldsmiths in the supervision of the experts from Archeological Survey of India. Earlier there were silver plates weighing 230 Kilograms. This was replaced by 23 kilograms of the gold plates. It was done over copper plates of 1000 kilograms” said Ajeyendra Ajay.

Avimukteshwaranand had on July 10 renewed the controversy as he claimed that 228 kilograms of the gold-platings were missing from the sanctum sanctorum walls of the Kedarnath temple but no investigation was ordered by the government yet. He also opposed construction of Kedarnath temple replica in Burari Delhi as the controversy blew up following participation of Uttarakhand chief minister Pushkar Singh Dhami in the foundation laying ceremony of the new temple in July.

However, the matter was resolved with the intervention of Dhami as the kedarnath temple construction trust on Tuesday announced not to name it as “Kedaranth Dham.”