Ayodhya, July 6: The man killed when the Ayodhya militants blew up their jeep yesterday was not a fellow militant but a local panda, police said today.

Romesh Pandey (22), guide-cum-junior-priest of some nearby temples, had probably walked hopefully up to the jeep, looking for clients, when he saw it pull up at the fencing around the disputed site.

He had apparently lingered on even after the occupants got off the car and strode away.

His wife, Bhagawati Devi, identified him at the morgue today from his slippers and wristwatch-band. Other than the hands, Pandey’s body was burnt beyond recognition.

“With the sixth man turning out to be a civilian, we now think there were only five militants in the operation,” deputy inspector-general of police Narendra Bahadur Singh said.

The dead man had variously been described as “a car cleaner” and “a driver” yesterday before the police settled on “an accomplice of the attackers”.

“He turned out to be a panda (junior priest) of the Jain temple and the couple of others that stand there ? just opposite the barricade where the blast took place yesterday,” a police officer said.

After post-mortem and identification, Pandey was cremated today.

Earlier, after taking pictures of the body at the morgue, the police were planning to dispose of it and had summoned a person who cremates unclaimed bodies.

But they were suddenly informed that a man who works as a panda at temples situated near the blast site did not return home last night. The police asked Pandey’s wife to come to the morgue. At 4 pm, she reached the morgue.

“She broke down in tears as she watched the scorched body of her husband,” said A.K. Ismail, a morgue employee.

“People coming in cars are prospective pilgrims for these pandas,” said Satyadeo Sharma, a local priest. “So he may have rushed to the passengers, mistaking them for devotees. He went to them as an agent of the Lord but got killed.”

The blast threw Pandey up in the air, in flames. One of his hands fell against the wall of the Jain temple while the rest of his body landed near the security barricade.

The residents of Katra, Pandey’s neighbourhood, were to meet the district magistrate late tonight in support of his family’s demand for compensation.