TDP seeks answers over ED’s Rs 230 crore Tirupati temple ghee adulteration claim

• TDP leader Jyosthna Tirunagari has called for accountability over the alleged supply of adulterated ghee to the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams (TTD) between 2019 and 2024.

• The Enforcement Directorate (ED) alleges that supplies worth about Rs 230 crore were involved, including Rs 96 crore worth of ghee allegedly manufactured by Sukriti Foods promoter Kailash Chand Mangla.

• Mangla was arrested on 17 September in a money laundering investigation and remanded to judicial custody.

TDP leader Jyosthna Tirunagari on Saturday demanded accountability over the alleged supply of adulterated ghee to the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams (TTD), citing an Enforcement Directorate investigation into supplies valued at about Rs 230 crore between 2019 and 2024.

Tirunagari alleged that the scale and duration of the supplies pointed to a planned pattern of adulteration during the previous YSRCP government’s tenure. Her comments followed the ED’s arrest of Kailash Chand Mangla, a promoter of Sukriti Foods, in the money laundering case.

According to the ED, a substance supplied to TTD as Agmark special grade cow ghee was allegedly made using refined palm oil, palm kernel oil, palmolein and other ingredients. The agency says the ghee was used to prepare Tirupati laddu prasadam. It attributes Rs 96 crore of the allegedly adulterated supplies to Mangla. The ED’s allegations and Mangla’s arrest were reported on Saturday.

The agency alleges that Mangla helped obtain the ingredients, manufactured the product at his factory and arranged supplies through other firms. It also claims he maintained false purchase and sales records to conceal the use of adulterants.

Mangla was arrested on 17 September and produced before a special Prevention of Money Laundering Act court in Visakhapatnam, which remanded him to judicial custody. The ED had earlier arrested Vipin Jain, a promoter and director of Bhole Baba Organic Dairy Milk, in the same investigation.

The allegations against those named in the case remain subject to judicial proceedings.

With IANS inputs