NEW DELHI: In an interview with journalist Abhishek Upadhyay on June 9, 2026, for his YouTube channel, Top Secret, that a former accountant with the Ram Janmabhoomi Teerth Kshetra Trust, Mahipal Singh, laid bare the flawed accounting process – with no mechanism for daily audit or accountability – at Hindutva’s marquee temple in Ayodhya.
Singh said during the course of this interview that the alleged theft of temple donations came to his attention in 2021. He also said that he had reached out to both Champat Rai and Gopal Rao – the secretary and invitee member of the trust, who have since resigned and been asked not to attend meetings, respectively – but his pleas led nowhere. Instead, he said, he was subtly asked to leave by another trustee, Anil Mishra, who had inducted a new person in Mahipal’s place.
The Wire news channel met a local resident, familiar with the trustees, who had been in touch with whistleblower Mahipal Singh in 2022, shortly before he left his job at the temple. Singh had shared his ordeal with this person, describing how he was witness to the corruption within the temple administration four years ago.
Singh’s family was close to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) in Kota, Rajasthan and had even given a piece of land for the construction of a temple in his hometown. Champat Rai, who is also the international vice president of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) frequented this temple, leading to familiarity between the two.
Once the construction of the Ram temple in Ayodhya began, Mahipal Singh opted for voluntary retirement from his bank job. He was handed the role of an accountant at the temple, a task to which he now dedicated his time.
Things, however, didn’t go as expected for Singh. According to the local resident, Singh had told him, “I was scared to see the kind of corruption [prevailing] there. It was a mistake to have come here… but then I thought that at least for eight months, I got an opportunity for darshan of the bhagwan.”
In 2022, Mahipal Singh had told the same local resident that he was looking for another job in Ayodhya. According to the local resident, Singh had said, “I’m the kind of person who has zero tolerance for corruption. And there [at the temple], full-fledged corruption had been going on, right in front of the CCTV cameras, where even I used to sit.”
When The Wire contacted whistleblower Mahipal Singh, he confirmed to this reporter, “It was on behalf of the Sangh [RSS] that I had been deployed to give sewa (work), free of cost [at the temple] between April 2021 to July 2022.” Singh, however, declined comment on the alleged involvement of the temple’s top management, including Rai and Anil Mishra, another trustee, or Gopal Rao and Govind Giri, the treasurer, in the alleged corrupt practices.
2022, Mahipal Singh had told the same local resident that he was looking for another job in Ayodhya. According to the local resident, Singh had said, “I’m the kind of person who has zero tolerance for corruption. And there [at the temple], full-fledged corruption had been going on, right in front of the CCTV cameras, where even I used to sit.”
When The Wire contacted whistleblower Mahipal Singh, he confirmed to this reporter, “It was on behalf of the Sangh [RSS] that I had been deployed to give sewa (work), free of cost [at the temple] between April 2021 to July 2022.” Singh, however, declined comment on the alleged involvement of the temple’s top management, including Rai and Anil Mishra, another trustee, or Gopal Rao and Govind Giri, the treasurer, in the alleged corrupt practices.
“Whatever I had to say is in the public domain,” said Singh, reiterating that he stood by the names of bank officials, Ratnesh Chaturvedi and Gagandeep, along with counting staff, who were allegedly involved in undervaluing voucher figures.
