BANGKOK, Thailand -- India's Hindu temples possess donated gold which
may equal half of America's Fort Knox bullion, but some are rejecting
demands by the government to reveal the value of their sacred
stockpiles.
"India's Hindu temples are resisting divulging their gold holdings,"
Reuters reported on Sept. 30.
For example one of the holiest Hindu temples in India, Kerala state's
Guruvayur temple, said it would not describe how much its gold was
worth after receiving an official request.
The London-based World Gold Council estimates India's temples possess
2,240 tons worth $84 billion at current prices.
The website of the U.S. Bullion Depository Fort Knox, Kentucky, says
its "present gold holdings" total "147.3 million ounces," or about
4,603 tons.
Fun Facts
Concern about huge caches of temples' gold began two years ago when
the ancient Sree Padmanabhaswamy temple in Trivandrum, Kerala,
announced it discovered $20 billion worth of bullion in secret
subterranean vaults.
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is the government's central bank, and
earlier this year it began requesting the amount of gold held by
temples across India, to determine how much was outside the banking
system.
"Temples in India hold large quantities of gold jewelry offered by
devotees to the deities," the RBI said in a February report, posted on
its website, which analyzed "recycling of domestic gold."
Publication Report
"It would be worth trying to channel the existing supplies of scrap
gold in the country into the financial system, so that the
unproductive nature of the gold asset is turned into a
financially-productive medium," the RBI said.
Critics suspect the RBI wants to use the gold to buy dollars, or boast
that India has huge gold reserves so New Delhi can attract foreign
investment and favorable loans, the Hindu newspaper reported.
In Mumbai, the Shree Siddhivinayak Ganpati temple, favored by
Bollywood celebrities, voluntarily placed 22 pounds of its gold into a
bank account, while keeping 310 pounds at the temple.
On the east coast, in conservative, wealthy Andhra Pradesh state, the
famous Tirupati temple deposited 5,000 pounds of gold in an
interest-paying State Bank of India account.
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Richard S. Ehrlich is a Bangkok-based journalist from San Francisco,
California, reporting news from Asia since 1978, and recipient of
Columbia University's Foreign Correspondent's Award. He is a co-author
of three non-fiction books about Thailand, including "Hello My Big Big
Honey!" Love Letters to Bangkok Bar Girls and Their Revealing
Interviews; 60 Stories of Royal Lineage; and Chronicle of Thailand:
Headline News Since 1946. Mr. Ehrlich also contributed to the final
chapter, Ceremonies and Regalia, in a new book titled King Bhumibol
Adulyadej, A Life's Work: Thailand's Monarchy in Perspective.
His websites are:
Asia Correspondent
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(Copyright 2013 Richard S Ehrlich)
