‘Thieves melted 400-yr-old idol’
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Age exclusive
In a revelation that is sure to spread outrage among devotees of Lord Ganesha throughout the state, The Asian Age has found out that the 400-year-old Suvarnaganesh idol, which was stolen from the Dive Agar temple earlier this year, has been melted by the thieves.
The Raigad police has been struggling to keep the matter under wraps ever since finding out about this, soon after the arrest of six accused in the theft earlier this month. Sources, however, have confirmed to this newspaper that the solid gold idol was melted soon after its theft.
“The four accused who planned and executed the theft gave the idol to the remaining two accused, who are goldsmiths. The duo melted the idol, reducing it to lumps of gold. We have recovered around 80 per cent of the gold and are trying to recover the rest,” said a senior officer with the Raigad police.
When contacted, R.D. Shinde, superintendent, Raigad police, neither confirmed nor denied the matter, saying that investigations are underway into the matter. The development is feared to attract outraged reactions from all quarters, from devotees to politicians to residents of Dive Agar.
The Suvarnaganesh idol was discovered in 1998 inside a copper box with Sanskrit inscriptions buried underneath the ground in Dive Agar.
The temple was then set up where the idol was discovered, and fast became one of the most popular
pilgrimage destinations in Maharashtra.
Sources said that the police is in a race against time to recover all the gold so that it can be moulded into an idol again and that only the temple trust has been informed about this.
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