NASHIK: Lakhs of rupees donated at the Shirdi Saibaba temple are in coins.
Now, the Shri Saibaba Sansthan Trust (SSST) is faced with a serious problem of plenty, as even banks are struggling to accommodate these coins deposited by the trust.
The trust has accounts in 13 branches of different state-owned banks. A dozen of them are in the temple town alone, and one is in Nashik.
Currently, all these banks collectively hold about Rs 11 crore of SSST money in the form of coins.
Four state-owned banks in Shirdi have now stopped taking coins due to space crunch, Rahul Jadhav, the CEO of the trust, said. “Officials of these four banks said they have no space to keep the coins they get every day. This is a big problem for the trust,” Jadhav said.
The trust will now write directly to the RBI seeking its intervention.

“Simultaneously, we have decided to approach banks in other parts of Ahmednagar district, as well as the state, to help us. We will open accounts of the trust in such banks, so that coins can be deposited there,” Jadhav said.
The monthly collection in the form of coins – from 50 paise to Rs 10 denomination – is close to Rs 28 lakh. Each bank, where the trust has an account, sends its personnel to the temple by rotation every month to collect donations and deposits.
In 2019, banks raised the issue with the SSST, saying that bags of coins are eating into space at their branches. At that time, the trust had offered the banks rooms within the temple premises to store these coins. However, the banks rejectedthe offer saying rules did not permit such an arrangement.