THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The recent controversy over the missing gold at Sabarimala temple has revealed the systemic flaws in the functioning of the Travancore Devaswom Board (TDB). While the board members change every two years, the absence of a top-level professional management is posing a challenge to efficient administration of temples and other institutions, said former chief secretary K Jayakumar, who served in various capacities with the board and Sabarimala.
Pitching for a Tirupati-model administration at the hill shrine, Jayakumar pointed at the need to plug loopholes in the Sabarimala administration by minimising manual interventions.
The senior bureaucrat, who led the high-powered committee for Sabarimala from 2012 to 17, said structural changes should be made in TDB for proper management of Sabarimala and other shrines. “On the Tirupati model, a senior IAS officer should be posted at the board’s helm,” he told TNIE as part of ‘Express Dialogues’.
Assigned by the state, Jayakumar had studied the functioning of the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams (TTD) Board. “I submitted the report in 2012. Sabarimala and Tirupati are different in nature. Tirupati allows darshan throughout the year. Here, the temple is opened periodically and hence there are some peculiar problems. A full-fledged office of TTD is functioning at Tirumala, led by a senior officer. That machinery is well geared to meet any eventuality,” he said.
Jayakumar said TDB should replace the “seasonal arrangements” at Sabarimala with a permanent system. In his report, he had suggested opening permanent offices of TDB at Pampa and Pathanamthitta. P4