The priest of a temple barely 20 metres from a police post at Newada in Uttar Pradesh’s Budaun district was found murdered on Monday.
The police are yet to identify the killers who they think intended to steal two silver crowns kept at the shrine named after Sai Baba. Multiple gods are worshipped at the temple.
Manoj Shankhwar, 40, from Kalliya Kazampur village in Kunwargaon was appointed the priest of the temple 15 years ago. Since then, he had been living in a room on the second floor of the shrine.
Brijesh Kumar Singh, senior superintendent of police of Budaun, said: “The priest was found dead in his room by the sweepers who came to clean the temple. His legs were tied and he was strangled with a cloth. Initial inquiry suggests that he was killed by those who had entered the premises to steal some valuables. We have formed a team to identify and arrest the killers.”
Singh said the killers also damaged a CCTV camera on the temple premises.
Several Hindutva groups alleged that the murder was aimed at terrorising priests and sadhus across the state and claimed that the Yogi Adityanath-led state government had failed to protect them.
Rajendra Kumar, a local Hindu Mahasabha leader, said the murder had proved that the criminals feared nobody.
“Shankhwar was a well-known priest of the area. He never closed the temple doors. Those who fear God will not commit this crime. Unfortunately, priests and ascetics are being killed in a state where the chief minister is himself a sadhu,” he said.
Adityanath is the mahant of a temple in Gorakhpur.
Over 40 sadhus have been killed in Uttar Pradesh in the last six years.
At least four sadhus have been killed this year only — in Rae Bareli’s Murtazanagar (October), Ayodhya (April), Barabanki (May) and Kushinagar (January).
The killings started in April 2020 with the murder of two sadhus in Bulandshahr. Sewa Das, 55 and Jagan Das, 45, were found in a pool of blood at a Shiva temple with which they had been associated for over 10 years. The police had arrested Raju Kumar alias Murari, who they claimed was angry with the duo for scolding him after he stole a tong from the premises.
The police have made several arrests following every such murder, but have found it difficult to establish the motive in most cases.