Why Sabarimala Gold Theft Is An Opening That Kerala BJP Cannot Afford To Squander

Of the many scams that the Enforcement Directorate has been involved in probing across the country, the Sabarimala gold scam is a unique one. It is not merely a case of financial irregularity or administrative failure. It strikes at the religious core of a state that millions of faithful look up to.

Sabarimala is to Kerala what Tirupati is to Andhra Pradesh or Vaishno Devi to Jammu. It is the temple the state is identified with. For the lakhs of devotees who undertake the vratham and trek up the sacred eighteen steps each year, Sabarimala is not just a pilgrimage destination but an article of faith. When gold meant for adorning Lord Ayyappa's sanctum is allegedly looted, it is not just theft. It is sacrilege. It is natural, then, that the matter has taken a deeply political turn.

To put it in perspective for the national reader: imagine gold being looted from the Ram Mandir in Ayodhya. That is the scale of outrage this scandal has provoked in Kerala.

This is not the first time Sabarimala has become a political flashpoint. In 2018, the Supreme Court's verdict allowing women of all ages to enter the shrine, and the Pinarayi Vijayan government's aggressive implementation of it, triggered massive protests. The BJP and Hindu organisations led the Sabarimala Samrakshana movement, and it paid dividends. The party's vote share in the Pathanamthitta Lok Sabha constituency surged, and it captured the Pandalam municipality for the first time.

But this time, the issue is fundamentally different.

The 2018 controversy, while evoking strong emotions, did divide Hindus to some extent. There were people who argued that temple practices must evolve with the times, and that barring women of a certain age group was discriminatory.

The gold scam admits no such ambiguity. No thinking Hindu can look away when sacred offerings to a deity are being systematically pilfered. There is no liberal versus conservative debate here, no question of reform versus tradition. This is plain loot from a place held sacred by millions. It unites rather than divides.

The Special Investigation Team probing the case has already arrested several high-profile figures, including former Travancore Devaswom Board presidents A. Padmakumar and N. Vasu, both associated with the CPI(M). The prime accused, Unnikrishnan Potti, allegedly sold gold from the temple's Dwarapalaka idols after taking them to Chennai for restoration work. In a major development, senior tantri Kandararu Rajeevaru was arrested on January 9, 2026, marking the first arrest from the tantri clan in the temple's history, for alleged close links to Potti and tacit permission for improper handling of gold-plated items.

The BJP, to its credit, has not merely targeted the CPI(M). It has also trained its guns on the Congress, and with good reason.

The probe has revealed an utter lack of systemic management and record-keeping in the temple administration, failures that span both Congress and CPI(M) tenures in government. This reinforces the BJP's longstanding political argument that the two fronts, the Left Democratic Front and the United Democratic Front, are essentially two sides of the same coin. The party has long accused them of tactical cross-voting to prevent BJP candidates from winning and of being ideological allies despite their public posturing. The Sabarimala scam now adds a devastating new dimension to this narrative: both fronts, when in power, failed to protect the state's most sacred shrine.

The BJP state unit, under president Rajeev Chandrasekhar, has taken up the issue with considerable energy. The party launched a massive signature campaign aiming to collect one crore signatures demanding Prime Minister Narendra Modi's intervention. On Makara Sankranti, it organised the Sabarimala Samrakshana Jyoti at over 10,000 locations across Kerala. Union Home Minister Amit Shah, addressing newly elected BJP local body representatives in Thiruvananthapuram, declared that "only the BJP can safeguard the faith of believers in Kerala" and demanded that the probe be handed over to a neutral central agency.

The scandal broke just as the Mandala Pooja pilgrimage season began in November 2025, with lakhs of devotees streaming into the hill shrine. Every news update about arrests and cover-ups landed while the faithful were in the midst of their vratham. The emotional resonance could not have been higher.

The timing also placed the issue squarely in the public mind during the December 2025 local body elections. The results were historic for the BJP. The party captured the Thiruvananthapuram Corporation for the first time ever, winning 50 of 101 wards. Across the state, it made significant gains in urban areas, demonstrating that it is no longer a marginal force in Kerala politics.

More importantly, with the state assembly elections scheduled for April 2026, the BJP has several months to keep the issue alive and build momentum. Temple administration is a state subject; the Travancore Devaswom Board functions under the state government. The assembly election is the natural forum where voters can hold the ruling dispensation accountable for this failure.

Yet, there is a complication the BJP must reckon with. In the local body polls, while the BJP made gains, it was the Congress-led UDF that emerged as the principal beneficiary of anti-incumbency against the LDF. According to one analysis, the UDF is now leading in an estimated 76 of Kerala's 140 assembly segments based on local body voting patterns.

This is the familiar pattern of Kerala's bipolar politics. When voters tire of one front, they default to the other. The BJP remains, in many constituencies, a distant third.

For the party to truly break through, it has to be seen as the primary alternative to the LDF, like in Bengal, where it surpassed the Congress and Left to become the largest opposition party.

This is easier said than done. The Congress is deeply entrenched in Kerala, and demographic factors, particularly the significant Muslim population that votes overwhelmingly for the UDF, work against the BJP.

But the Sabarimala gold scam is precisely the kind of issue that can consolidate Hindu voters across caste and class lines in favour of the BJP. If handled well, it can shift the party from being seen as a third force to a credible contender for power.

Consider this: if a state like Tamil Nadu, where Hindus are often considered apathetic to the mixing of religion and politics, could see lakhs gather for the Hindu Munnani's Murugan Maanadu, then Kerala, with its more religiously conscious Hindu population, offers even greater possibilities.

The state unit has been doing its part, but the issue needs national amplification. With BJP national president Nitin Nabin now in place and Prime Minister Modi expected to visit Kerala soon, the Sabarimala gold scam must become an issue discussed in every corner of the country, by every Hindu who cares about the sanctity of temples.

This does not mean abandoning the BJP's broader messaging on development and governance. Kerala is reasonably well placed on matters of basic necessity, literacy, healthcare, and social indicators. Voters there are not moved by bijli-sadak-paani rhetoric alone.

But on matters of Hindu religion and culture, Kerala has suffered under decades of atheistic Left rule and minority-appeasement politics from both fronts. The common people have kept the flame of tradition alive, but the state's institutional apparatus has been indifferent at best, hostile at worst. Much like its finances, Kerala's Hindu culture needs revival.

Some will label this communalism. But this is not polarisation, it is how popular politics works.

If the other two parties refuse to treat the plunder of a sacred shrine with the seriousness it deserves, it becomes politically and morally inevitable that the BJP steps in to occupy that space and properly fix it.

The Sabarimala gold scam has handed the BJP a historic opportunity. It is now up to the party to use it well.