The ISKCON Radhakanta Temple in Bangladesh's Dhaka was vandalised by a group of around 200 people on Thursday, 17 March, ahead of the Hindu festival of Holi, news agency ANI reported.
Radharamn Das, vice-president of ISKCON, Kolkata, said, "Last evening when devotees were preparing for Gaura Purnima celebration, a mob of 200 people entered the premises of Shri Radhakanta Temple in Dhaka and started vandalising it."
He also said that three devotees had been injured during the incident, adding that the police were called immediately and managed to drive the mob away.
Meanwhile, Senior Adviser in the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Kanchan Gupta, shared a video of the attack.
Attack Related to Dispute Over Land: BHBCUC
Amani Krishna Das, a priest at the temple, said that two of the priest's assistants were injured when miscreants stormed the temple by breaking one of the boundary walls, according to BBC Bangla.
Amani also alleged that the attackers took away a statue from the temple. However, a team of Hindu-Buddhist-Christian Unity Parishad (BHBCUC), who visited the site, said that there was no evidence of looting, the BBC Bangla report added.
BHBCUC said that the priest's assistants were injured while trying to prevent people from breaking down the wall. Amani and the War Police Officer-in-Charge Kabir Hossain also acknowledged the dispute over the temple's land.
Meanwhile, a Twitter post tried to communalise the incident by claiming that the attack took place on the "night Shab-e-Barat. However, Shab-e-Barat was not celebrated in Bangladesh on Thursday night. Moreover, all parties involved in the incident have denied any religious angle and said that the boundary wall was demolished due to a property dispute.
'Provide Security to Hindu Minority'
Emphasising that the attack was a matter of immense concern, Das appealed to the Bangladesh government to take strict action against the culprits and extend security protection to minority Hindus in the country, as per a report by ANI.
Meanwhile, the High Commission of India is in touch with Bangladeshi authorities regarding the attack, ANI reported.
Bangladeshi authorities stated that the incident seems to have taken place due to a dispute over the land on which the temple was built.
A similar incident had taken place on 16 October 2021, when an ISKCON temple in Bangladesh's Noakhali was vandalised, leading to the death of a devotee. This attack came just a few days after incidents of communal attacks were reported across several Hindu temples in Bangladesh.
The attacks began after there were reports that a Quran was allegedly desecrated at a Durga Puja pandal in Cumilla.
(With inputs from ANI.)
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