Bhubaneswar: A local volunteer watch group has sprung into action to protect the statue of Mahatma Gandhi in front of a temple in New York, which was smashed early this week.
The New York Post reported that six men smashed the Gandhi statue at the Sri Tulsi Mandir to pieces around 1:30 am on Tuesday with a sledgehammer and painted it with obscenities. The suspects are in the age group of 25 to 30 years.
This is the latest in a series of attacks on Gandhi statues in the US and this was the second attack on the memorial. The statue was vandalised earlier on August 3 and knocked over, according to the Queens Daily Eagle. The statue was completely demolished in the second attack.
Meanwhile, volunteer watch group, the Cityline Ozone Park Civilian Patrol, tweeted on Thursday that its members increased their presence around the temple. “We increased our presence at Tulsi Mandir and were happy to see (police from) the 106 Precinct there as well. A big thank you to our four volunteers who were out for 7 hours overnight,” it said in a tweet.
In February this year, a life-sized Gandhi statue was destroyed in Manhattan, NYC.
