A stolen ancient idol of Lord Hanuman is repatriated to India

New Delhi, April 25: The ancient Lord Hanuman’s idol, which was stolen from the Vishnu temple in Tamil Nadu, dates back to the 14th–15th centuries when the Chole were ruling, is brought back to India.

The Union Minister for Culture, Tourism, and Development of the North-eastern Region (DoNER) shared this information through Twitter, sharing the photo of the idol with the caption “the repatriation of our rightful artifacts.” He further wrote about the details of the status, “the metal idol of Lord Hanuman that was stolen from a Vishnu temple in Shri Varatharaja Perumal, Pottaveli Vellur, Ariyalur district.”

The idol of Lord Hanuman was stolen from the area of Pottaveli Vellur, Ariyalur district. Which was documented by the French Institute of Pondicherry in 1961.

In 2014, the idol was auctioned and brought in by a buyer in Australia. Upon discovering it, it was found to be the same one that was stolen from India. The buyer was unaware of the matter. After a thorough investigation, the idol was handed over to the Indian embassy in Australia. And was brought back to India last week, handed over to the Tamil Nadu Idol Win as a case property on April 18.

G. Krishan Reddy, the minister of DoNER, said that “till date, there have been 251 antiquities retrieved, back from different countries, and out of that, a total of 238 have been brought back since 2014.”