A special team of the Idol Wing CID recently arrested nine persons in connection with the seizure of three metal idols that were meant for illegal sale.
The idols, recovered at Pudukottai town, were those of Gaja Samahara Moorthy, Goddess Sivagami Amman and Usnisa Vijaya Dharani, a goddess of Buddhism worshipped in Nepal and Tibet.
The temples from which the idols were stolen and the period to which they belong are yet to be ascertained. The Idol Wing CID received information about the activities of gangs selling idols in Chennai, Pudukottai, Tiruchi, Madurai and Kumbakonam. A special team headed by Additional Superintendent of Police G. Balamurugan was formed, as per an order of the Additional Director General of Police, Idol Wing CID,Shailesh Kumar Yadav.
The special team planted sources in Pudukottai, Kumbakonam and Tiruchi and were keeping an eye on illegal transportation of idols under the guise of trade. The team received credible information that an individual in Pudukottai town was trying to sell some idols for ₹10 crore.
The team negotiated with that gang and agreed to purchase the idols for ₹10 crore. A four-member gang then arrived, on December 1 in a car at the Malaiyeedu roundabout in Pudukottai town, as agreed upon. A police team in plainclothes was waiting there. The team approached the gang and negotiated with them to get the idols. The four persons in the car identified as Padmanabhan, Pushparaj, Ramachandran and Mannaiah showed the three metal idols to the team and told them that they were antique idols worth ₹10 crore in international market, a press release from the Idol Wing CID said.
The team then detained the four persons and conducted an interrogation. They were asked to provide the provenance of the idols and documents, besides the source relating to the three idols. They could not produce documents but named some persons who had given them the idols. However the police were not satisfied as they did not give proper details about how they had obtained the idols. Subsequently, they were arrested and the idols and the car in which they came were confiscated by the team.
Five more persons were later arrested. The Idol Wing CID police registered a case in this connection.
All the nine accused were produced before the Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate Court at Kumbakonam in Thanjavur district and lodged in the Central Prison, Tiruchi, the press release said.
