The Anantapur police on Friday busted three inter-State treasure hunter gangs and arrested 18 persons allegedly involved in it. The police also seized two earthmovers, eight two-wheelers, one car, and eight mobile phones used by the accused in the operations over the past several months.
Superintendent of Police Fakkeerappa Kaginelli, displaying the equipment seized and producing the accused, told a press conference that the treasure hunting operations in Kanaganapalli, Roddam, and Yadiki were done with highly sophisticated equipment to reduce the amount of time they spend.
“These gangs operated mostly in the vicinity of some ancient temple or other religious places where the locals believed huge amounts of gold and silver articles were tucked away by people in those times. Mostly believing in hearsay or in fortune-tellers from Karnataka, Maharashtra, and Telangana, the suspected treasure hunters mostly dug deep in and around temples,” Mr. Fakeerappa said.
In majority of cases, these “treasure hunters” did not find anything worthwhile and it just became a vice for them by investing time and money in their eagerness to earn a fast buck, the SP said.
The accused were unsuccessful in finding any treasure though they had made such attempts at several places in the past also, he added. “We could get all the videos of their efforts from their cellphones seized from the spot,” he added.
Keshavaiah and Nagaraju in Daduluru village of Kanaganapalli mandal own 4.98 acres, where a large blackstone block existed with some writing on it in undeciphered language, which made them believe there was treasure underneath the slab, which prompted four persons to use an earthmover and dig the place. The Kanaganapalli police arrested them while the operations were going on in the night. At Roddankapalli village in Roddam mandal a “sasanam on a plaque” believed to be that of Sri Krishnadevaraya period, made B. Eswarappa believe that there was a treasure in the 1.98 acres of land owned by him in which the plaque existede. Six persons, including a mastermind from Tumkur in Karnataka, were arrested and an earthmover along with two two-wheelers were seized.
In Yadiki mandal at Kundanakota old fort area, Kaluri Venkata Satyanarayana along with seven others acquired two different sets of sophisticated metal detectors, which reportedly could show if there was gold, silver, or diamonds and dug up at several places. Here too the Yadiki police nabbed eight persons, and seized four two-wheelers, a car, 2 metal detectors, and implements for digging.