Close to 20 ‘sarappoli’ chains stored in vault A of Sree Padmanabhaswamy Temple here were inventoried on Thursday by the expert committee on the temple constituted by the Supreme Court.
Some of these chains had precious stones affixed on them. After being inventoried, these articles were kept back in vault A inside a special metal box. Sources familiar with the process told The Hindu that there were about eight metal boxes in vault A containing jewels, gems, chains and crowns, and other articles. Vault A was opened shortly after 9 a.m. and one box was chosen for inventorying.
Last year, when the C.V. Ananda Bose committee opened vault A it was found that the wooden boxes inside which the jewels and chains were kept had rotted away. After preparing a list of these articles, the Ananda Bose committee had transferred these articles to metal boxes.
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The inventoried articles in this vault were being stored in another set of metal boxes. This was but a temporary measure, sources said. These and other articles in the temple’s vaults would finally be moved to vault C for long-term storage. The expert committee expects the inventorying of vault A to get completed in about five to six months, the sources added.