The High Court on Tuesday stayed the remarks made by the Kollam Vigilance court in its order granting bail to Sabarimala tantri Kandararu Rajeevaru, the 16th accused in the case. Justice A Badharudeen ordered on Tuesday that notice be sent to tantri regarding SIT's plea against his bail. 

In the order granting bail to tantri in February 2026 in two cases, the Enquiry Commissioner and Special Judge (Vigilance), Kollam, said that there was not even an iota of evidence from the side of the Special Investigation Team (SIT) to establish any positive involvement of tantri in the alleged irregularities. Rajeevaru was arrested by the SIT on January 9, 2026. 

Initially arrested for alleged gold theft from door frames, he was arrested again in the second case while being in judicial custody. The Vigilance court had said that tantri cannot sit in judgment over the formal decisions of the Travancore Devaswom Board to hand over Sabarimala temple artefacts for repair to Unnikrishnan Potty, the first accused in the case. 

The bail plea submitted by tantri's counsels, B Raman Pillai, Sujesh Menon, and C D Anil pointed out that the SIT fabricated a case by twisting his silence into conspiracy.

The Vigilance court's remarks in the order dealt a severe blow to the SIT and it even ballooned into a political row with the opposition posing serious questions against the state government. In his bail plea, tantri had said that he was dragged into the case as a result of a political conspiracy since he had opposed the entry of women into Sabarimala temple in 2018.

The SIT filed an appeal in the High Court challenging the bail order and prayed to the court to expunge the adverse remarks made by the Vigilance court judge against the investigation, saying that the observations are unwarranted and prejudicial to the probe. In its plea, the SIT enclosed a list of crucial evidence which, according to the Crime Branch, showed the direct involvement of tantri along with the other accused in the conspiracy and misappropriation of huge quantity of cladded gold from the sanctum sanctorum of the temple. 

The SIT said in the plea that the Vigilance court judge ignored all the facts and circumstances, the role played by the tantri, strong objections raised by the prosecution and made unwarranted and unnecessary observations which would interfere with the ongoing investigation. 

The SIT cited that the Vigilance court order suffered from serious legal infirmities, overlooked material evidence collected during the investigation and resulted in a grave miscarriage of justice.