The Idol Wing-Criminal Investigation Department (CID) on Friday told the Madras High Court that it had booked 49 idol theft cases, arrested 109 accused and recovered 128 stolen idols since December 1, 2019. Of the recovered idols, 13 were repatriated from the United States, London and Australia.
In a status report filed before a special Division Bench of Justices R. Mahadevan and P.D. Audikesavalu, who were seized of cases related to temple properties, the Idol Wing-CID said it had also registered 13 cases, arrested 69 accused and recovered 55 idols between July 21, 2017 and December 1, 2019.
R. Dinakaran, Inspector General of Police, Idol Wing-CID, said nine more idols were recovered from the United States and Australia between 2014 and December 1, 2019. Of the 22 idols recovered from foreign countries since 2014, 13 were given to the temples concerned and nine are with the Archaeological Survey of India.
Additional Advocate General P. Kumaresan submitted the status report in response to a contempt of court petition filed by retired Idol Wing-CID head A.G. Ponn Manickavel in 2019 against the then Chief Secretary Girija Vaidyanathan, Home Secretary Niranjan Mardi, Director General of Police T.K. Rajendran and others.
Petitioner’s counsel V. Selvaraj recalled that the special Division Bench had appointed Mr. Manickavel, as a Special Officer, to continue the investigation in a host of idol theft cases, just hours before he was about to retire from service on November 30, 2018, giving him the liberty to form a special investigation team.
Thereafter, he had filed the contempt plea against the top officials of the State government, alleging excessive interference by them in performing his duties without political and bureaucratic interference. He had also alleged that a senior Minister and the DGP were sneaking into the investigation.
While hearing the matter on Friday, the judges wondered how the AAG could defend the alleged contemnors, especially when most of them had retired from service. They directed him to take instructions by next week on whether those individuals should engage private lawyers or appear in person before the court.
In the meantime, in compliance of the directions issued by the Bench during the last hearing to disclose the status of various idol theft cases, R. Dinakaran, Inspector General of Police, Idol Wing-CID, told the court that 276 cases were transferred to the court-constituted SIT, till November 30, 2019.
Subsequently, 101 more cases were transferred. Apart from this, the Idol Wing-CID had registered new cases and arrested several accused, besides recovering many idols. Though the case diaries in 41 idol theft cases had gone missing, the police traced out 28 of those diaries and registered fresh cases in 11 of them, the I-G said.
After taking the status report on file, the judges adjourned the contempt petition for further hearing to April 27.
