Under attack by opposition parties over deposits of Rs 545 crore of Lord Jagannath in capital-starved Yes Bank, the Odisha government on Sunday sought the Centre’s intervention for release of the funds in the interest of devotees, India Today has reported.

Odisha: Odisha’s Finance Minister Niranjan Pujari has urged the Centre to give necessary instruction to the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to allow the release of the deposited amount with the crisis-hit Yes Bank.

In a letter to Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman Pujari said various funds related to Shree Jagannath Temple in Puri are managed by a committee of the Shree Jagannath Temple Administration (SJTA).

“Out of these funds, an amount of Rs 545 crore has been deposited with Yes Bank, Puri in the form of TDRs,” he said.

Moreover the deposited amount will mature this month.

The RBI has limited the withdrawals from Yes Bank at Rs 50,000 for the next one month and imposed strict limits on operations after the cash-starved Yes Bank faced “regular outflow of liquidity” following an effort to raise new capital failed.

“Shree Jagannath Temple Administration (SJTA) is a statutory authority working under provisions of an Act of the state government. This is an issue of religious importance for devotees of Lord Jagannath.”

“In this background, I request you to kindly issue necessary instruction to RBI to allow release of deposits relating to SJTA in Yes Bank in the interest of millions of devotees,” Pujari wrote.

BJP’s Odisha unit general secretary Prithviraj Harichandan alleged that depositing money in the cash-starved lender smacked of a conspiracy.

Quoting an official report of 2017, he claimed that it was decided to park the funds of Lord Jagannath in 25 banks and Yes Bank was not in the list that time.

However, in July 2019, the funds were deposited as Yes Bank was included in the list, Harichandan claimed. He further added, that “it smells of a conspiracy to rip-off the temple funds.”

 However the RBI has said that the money of all the depositors is safe,” he added.

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