Robbery at temple

DEVOTION: A devotee worships at the Hare Krishna temple in Longdenville yesterday, hours after bandits broke into the temple, accosted the custodian and stole cash, a stereo system and even gold trinkets which adorned several murtis.
DEVOTION: A devotee worships at the Hare Krishna temple in Longdenville yesterday, hours after bandits broke into the temple, accosted the custodian and stole cash, a stereo system and even gold trinkets which adorned several murtis.

SEETA PERSAD

AN EARLY morning robbery yesterday at the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON) Hare Krishna Temple in Longdenville has left devotees traumatised. It came hours after religious leaders on Sunday said that criminals are viewing worshippers including Hindus as “soft and easy” targets.

“If in the place of worship a person cannot feel safe, then we are in a dangerous position as Trinidadians. There are evil-minded men walking among us bent on harming us in the worst of ways,” the temple’s president Gopta Das said adding only through the mercy of Lord Krishna, blood was not shed during the robbery.

The robbery, he said, is a wake-up call for all religious institutions and people must be careful of those who choose to live a life of banditry and murder.

Police said two gunmen and two other men armed with cutlasses broke open the temple doors at 2 am and tied up a devotee while demanding he tell them where the money was. The bandits stole $2,500 from a donation vault, $10,000 from an adjoining office and a sound system worth $2,500. They also pulled off golden trinkets which adorned marble murtis (holy statues) in the temple, before escaping in waiting vehicles.

The temple is also used as a home for devotees who want to spend their lifetime in service to Lord Krishna, Das said. “They shot the locks off the vault and took all the money devotees had offered on Sunday night,” Das said.

He called on National Security Minister Edmund Dillon to do “whatever it takes” to arrest the crime situation adding that criminals must be put away as they are not fit to live among law-abiding citizens. He however stopped short of calling for armed guards at places of worship.

Das said the money donated by devotees are used to purchase items that go towards meals for the poor as well as to feed devotees who spend their time in daily worship.

On May 19, four masked men broke into the Lakshmi Narayan Temple in Freeport and made off with $160,000 worth of cash and jewellery taken from worshippers at 2 am. Bandits also recently held up and robbed relatives and friends of Princes Town MP Barry Padarath while they prayed inside a temple.

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