BENGALURU: Seven people, all members of pro-Kannada organisations, were arrested by Bengaluru city police for allegedly defacing the statue of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj at Bashyam Circle in Sadashivanagar on Friday.
They were identified as: Chethan Gowda, president, Kannada Ranadheera Pade; Gurudeva Narayan Kumar, president, central committee of Akhila Karnataka Kannada Chaluvali and their associates Varun, Naveen Gowda, Vinod, Yogesh and Chethan Kumar.
MN Anucheth, the deputy commissioner of police (central), said the miscreants smeared black paint on the statue. Sadashivanagar police registered an FIR and multiple teams have been formed to trace and nab other suspects.
“Based on clues, we arrested five people on Saturday and two more on Sunday. Efforts are on to nab others involved in the offence,” said Anucheth.
Additional forces
Police say the incident occurred around 12.30am on Friday. On Friday morning, passersby alerted police, who cleaned the statue and deployed additional personnel to thwart a possible backlash.
Police say the suspects confessed to their crime and said they were angry about some Maharashtra Ekikaran Samiti (MES) activists setting a Kannada flag afire in Maharashtra last week. Preliminary investigation revealed a gang of 13 people arrived in a car, two autorickshaws and a bike to the spot. They had hatched the plan four days earlier.
Initially, the gang had zeroed in on another statue of Shivaji near Town Hall, but finally decided on the statue near Sankey Tank. They recced the area on Monday and left a ladder near the statue on Tuesday. They had planned to deface the statue on Wednesday night, but left after finding police near the spot. They finally succeeded on Thursday-Friday night
