Tirupati Urban Police put full stop to Srikalahasti temple idols row

Tirupati: A major breakthrough in the state level sensational case in which Nadi and Shiva Lingam idols were placed unofficially at inside the Srikalahasti temple by some miscreants a week ago. In the case Srikalahasti police have arrested three brothers in a family of Puttur town in the Chittoor district, on Monday evening. And they seized two motorbikes and three mobile phones from them. Tirupati Urban SP A Ramesh Reddy has disclosed the accused arrest and case investigation details to the media in his office here, on Tuesday afternoon. It may be noted that a big political controversy had taken place a week ago over this issue. BJP and Janasena political parties staged protests at Srikalahasti as well at many places across the state for seeking action against the culprits and criticized the YSRCP ruling.

In the backdrop, Tirupati Urban SP Remesh Reddy took this case investigation as a prestige and formed three special teams to nab the accused who placed the new Nandi and Lingam idols inside the Srikalahasti temple.

According to Tirupati Urban SP, On this issue Srikalahasti temple EO lodged a complaint with one town police On September 12, that some strangers had placed new Nadi and Shiva Lingam idols at Dwajasthambam inside the temple. Over his complaint police registered a case CR.Nog 280/2020 under sections 120(B), 447, 297, R/w 34 IPC. Later for investigating the case SP has formed three special teams to crack the case in a speed manner. As part of a case investigation police deeply examined the temple inside and outside 100 CC Cameras footage and noticed that three persons were entered into the temple by carrying idols Nandi and Shiva Lingam On September 6. On the basis of CCTV footage police speeded up the case investigation.

As well as police found that two persons who were identified in CC Cameras went on bike towards Tirupati. Following these details police identified the bike registration numbers TNO2 U2784, APO3 J9294. By these details police searched for the accused in Chennai, Madurai and Tirupati. But they failed in finding the accused in the case due to unavailability of proper bikes registration details. Later, police collected the accused phone numbers from those bike old owners and caught them in Puttur town.

The accused were identified as brothers P Sulavardhan (32), P Thirumalaiah (30), P Munishekar (28) of one family. The SP said that the first two accused were addicted to bad habits and stuck in financial troubles, due to that they did not get married as long as till the 30 years of age. By the belief on superstition as per the advice of an astrologer they readied to place idols of Nandi and Shiva Lingam in Srikalahasti temple. For carving the idols they paid Rs 7000 to a stone carving artisan Muragesan near Rajeev Gruhakalpa house in Tirupati. On September 5 they received the idols from Murgesan and went to their hometown Puttur, from there they proceeded to Srikalahasti temple on September 6 and placed the idols on the same day in the temple.