In the wake of media reports that the members of the Satya Sai Baba Central Trust have resorted to diversion of Sai wealth following the confiscation of Rs.35 lakh from the employees of the Trust member Srinivasan, the government is mulling appointing an IAS officer to control the affairs of the trust in the same way as the Aurobindo Ashram in Pondicherry is controlled.

There are demands from several quarters that the government should take over the Sai Central trust to ensure its smooth functioning after controversies erupted about the role being played by the Trust members following the hospitalization of Sai Baba. The controversies deepened after the death of Sai Baba with media reporting that trust members have indulged in diversion of Sai wealth.

Prior to the proposal to implement its idea of appointing a government nominee on the Trust to control its affairs, the chief minister sought an intelligence report on the Sai Trust members and also called for a report from the trust itself on the affairs of the trust.

The government is also planning to put to commercial use several services run by the government to make it viable in the long in view of the possibility of the volume of donations coming down after the death of Sai Baba.

Sai Baba’s assets are valued at more than Rs.40,000 Cr and the trust runs several educational and medical institutions, drinking water projects apart from a railway station and an airport.