A 15-member high-level team of the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI), led by Joint Director General SB Ota on Friday inspected the Jagamohan and Garbhagruha of the Shree Jagannath Temple here.
Prof Arun Menon of IIT Chennai and Prof Simani Bhatacharjee of IIT Kharagpur, besides core committee vice-chairperson GC Mitra, another team from the Institute of Structural Engineering, Roorki, also examined the damaged portion of the Jagamohan and the Garbhagruha.
The teams after inspection held a meeting and discussed over the condition of the structure. The teams found carbon deposit on the wall and roof of the Garbhagruha and advised to instal more cold air pumping systems to increase inflow of cool air into the Garbhagruha and flush out the hot air from it.
As regards damage of Jagamohan, the experts opined that all the seven small arches in the wall of the Jagamohan would be repaired and reinforced with steel frames, besides lamination. They detected water seepage from the roof of the Jagamohan which corroded the crude iron beams used in the structure causing damage.
The seepage of water would be stopped after repairs. The ASI Director General is scheduled to visit the temple very soon, it is learnt.
The ASI and the core technical team, as per statutory annual practice, examined the Garbhagruha during the Rath Yatra when the deities remained away from the main temple. Superintending Archaeologist of Bhubaneswar Circle MS A Naik, AK Patel, J Sharma, TJ Alony, RS Jamuel, BS Patra, D Mishra and CK Mishra were present, besides temple administrator PC Hota. This is the largest expert team which examined the damaged temple.