Mangalore, November 4: Mangalore City Police on Friday stepped up the security arrangements in the city police limits, especially for religious institutions of minority communities, in the wake of attack on St Alphonsa Catholic Church.
According to Fr Shibi, the assistant parish priest, the man identified as Shibu barged into the the Church, when the priests had just finished their supper. He went on destroying the property and damaged the statues of Jesus Christ too, without caring the priests present there. He also undressed himself and tried to wear priestly robe after gaining entry into sacristy.
However, he was caught and handed over to the police by students who stay in the adjacent hostel, he said.
Seemanth Kumar Singh, Commissioner of Police, who visited the Church on Thursday night and Friday morning told media persons that the issue was a matter of concern.
"We will be in touch with the heads of such places of worships and discuss with them their security needs as dictated by the local situation," Mr Singh said.
Security would be more pronounced at night. Services of home guards were also being utilised to deal with the situation, he said.
Mr Singh said that the personnel of Mangalore East Police station had taken the miscreant for questioning.
"We are trying to establish if he carried out this act on his own or on someone's instruction," the Commissioner said, adding that his background and motives too are being probed.
"We are also trying to find out if he or anyone of his accomplices were involved in a recent incident where a religious symbol at a school was damaged," he said.
Meanwhile, Dr Aloysius Paul D'Souza, Bishop of Mangalore Diocese, visited the Church on Friday morning and collected details of the incident. He was apprised of the sequence of events by the parish priest and the eyewitnesses.
He urged police to take necessary actions to prevent the recurrence of such vandalism.
Former Union Minister B Janardhan Poojary also visited the Church. He condemned the act of vandalism and demanded the police a through inquiry into the matter.
The kidnapped schoolboy was rescued by the police and reunited with his parents. Son of a gift shop owner from Basavanagudi area in Bengaluru, Chirag has reportedly told police that decided to make some quick money to spend on cricket betting and gambling after learning kidnap tricks from the ‘Crime Patrol’. According to police, Chirag reached a private school around 3pm on Tuesday on a Bounce rental bike and zeroed in on a fourth standard student who was walking out of school. He told the boy he was his father's friend and that he required help to search for a relative who had gone missing. The boy believed Chirag and rode pillion on the bike. Chirag then engaged the boy in conversation and learnt about his father's business and got his mobile phone number. He then made a call to the boy's father, demanded Rs 5 lakh and warned him against approaching cops. However, the boy's father alerted Cottonpet police and special teams were formed to crack the case. While Cottonpet inspector Venkatesh TC's squad verified CCTV footage in and around the school, Chamarajpet inspector BG Kumaraswamy's team started tracking the suspect's mobile phone movements. An hour later, the suspect's location was traced to a hotel on the Lavelle Road-St Mark's Road stretch. Police rushed there, rescued the boy and arrested Chirag.
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