Darbhanga, Aug. 20: The police have reopened two cases of theft of rare manuscripts reported in 2003 after a local court this week granted permission to re-investigate the case in the light of the new findings.
The court granted permission regarding case number 175/03 related with the theft of 15 handwritten manuscripts of medieval Maithili poet Vidyapati from the library of Kameswar Singh Sanskrit University (KSSD). The theft supposedly took place on November 29, 2003.
Among the 26 stolen manuscripts, there was a 700-palm-leaf manuscript of Srimad Bhagavad Gita composed by Vidhyapati.
It created an uproar and agitation among the locals, who feel that the treasures of Mithilanchal are being systematically stolen for many years. They demanded a CBI inquiry.
The police have swung into action seven years later, after news reports of a senior customs official of Hazipur confiscating some manuscripts from four youths on their way to Patna in August.
Bihar Legislative Council chairman Tarakant Jha intervened and demanded that the state government start a fresh investigation of the case.
The police approached the court to allow the reopening of the cases of KSSU stating all these cases are interlinked.
City superintendent of police (SP) Ranjeet Kumar Mishra told The Telegraph: “We have started investigation into both the cases where manuscripts worth crores were stolen. There must be an organised gang carrying out these crimes, and they should be apprehended.”
However, Mishra said the manuscripts seized in Hazipur are written in Arabic whereas manuscripts stolen from KSSD and Mithila Research Institute (MRI) were written in Sanskrit or Mithilakshar script.
Nevertheless, the SP insisted: “All these cases are interlinked. A fresh investigation is required.”
Though the police investigation of the MRI case remained inconclusive, it had submitted chargesheet against five suspects including Vidhadhar Mishra, Bhubhanchandra Chaudhary, Rajendra Thakur, Sonelal Paswan, Pawan Chaudhary and Umashankar, all of whom are KSSD employees.
To assuage public outrage, the government had handed over the case to the Crime Investigation Department (CID), which completed the investigation. However, the investigation did not yield the desired results. The CID could neither recover the manuscripts nor identify the culprits.
Following the order of the court, university police station-in-charge K.N. Singh has been asked to investigate both the cases.
