Gold stolen from 600-year-old temple

SERAMPORE: The 600-year-old Mahesh Jagannath temple became a victim of sacrilege before dawn on Wednesday when burglars looted gold and silver ornaments from deities of Lord Jagannath, Balaram and Subhadra.
While police said that 5 kg of silver ornaments and three gold tips, one each on the foreheads of the three deities, were missing, Sebayets backed by locals said that at least 11 gold tips and two gold necklaces were burgled.The value of stolen silver alone stands at around Rs 2.25 lakh. The donation box was also stolen.
Sebayet Panchanan Chakraborty said, "I found the collapsible gate of the temple open with locks missing though the main gate of the complex was closed. I entered the temple only to find all ornaments on the deities missing." said Chakraborty who informed police. As dawn broke, news of the temple burglary spread in the area and locals gathered around the temple.
Around 9.30am, additional SP (industrial) Amitabha Verma reached the temple with other cops. Cops inspected the temple and launched an investigation into the burglary.
After preliminary investigation, Verma said that the locks of the collapsible gate were probably stolen. They were neither broken nor cut, he asserted.
Police drew this conclusion as Sebayets never heard any sound of breaking at night and there were no marks on the collapsible gate to indicate that the locks were cut. Sleuths are investigating whether burglars made duplicate keys of the locks.
Strangely, there was no additional security around the temple though ornaments have been stolen from different temples in Hooghly's Goghat, Khanakul, Dashghora and Serampore's Madan Mohan temple over the last two months.
Locals in Mahesh near Serampore, Hooghly rued that the deities in the historic temple stood without any ornaments on them, perhaps for the first time in centuries. "We can't imagine that such a thing could happen in Mahesh," was the common refrain among locals.
Meanwhile, locals were shocked with the news of heist. Mahesh is famous for its traditional Rath Yatra celebrated since 1397, a festival that is second only to the one at Puri. The temple was built on the initiative of the great Bengali sage Drubananda Brahmachari back in the 14{+t}{+h} century. Legend has it that Lord Jagannath instructed appeared in Drubananda's dream and asked him to build a Jagannath temple in Mahesh. The sage had this dream when he was on a fast unto death in front of the Jagannath temple in Puri where priests prevented him from offering 'bhog' to the Lord.