Priest among 4 clubbed to death inside Pali temple

Jodhpur: In a gruesome incident, three persons were bludgeoned to death while another sustained serious injuries, when some unidentified persons barged into a temple in Pichava village of Pali district on Tuesday night.

The murderers decamped with jewellery adorning the deities of the temple and cash from the donation box.

Before looting the temple, they shifted all the bodies into a room in the temple. On the information, police rushed to the spot and found one of them alive with grave injuries.

As news spread in the village, people assembled at the temple. They demanded immediate arrest of the accused and blocked the road. The villagers relented only after the police assured them of immediate arrest of the accused. The situation in the village is tense but under control.

According to SHO (Sumerpur), Sumer Singh, four persons including the priest of the famous Chamunda temple in village Pichava were sleeping in the temple on Tuesday night.

"Some unidentified persons barged into the temple in the night and smashed the head of all the four persons with sticks, they carried with them ensuring that all were dead," said Singh.

After that they shifted all the bodies assuming all of them to be dead in a room in the temple premises and went on to collect the jewellery and other valuables including the cash from the donation box and decamped.

Three of them including the priest were found to be dead on the arrival of the police while the fourth was found to be alive, who was rushed to the hospital immediately with serious head injuries.

"We have started the investigation based on the modus operandi of the criminals and have launched a hunt for them," said Singh.