A group of unknown miscreants have vandalised, broken and ripped from the base a statue of Mahatma Gandhi in a park in the US state of California.
The incident happened in the Central Park of the City of Davis in northern California, where the 6-ft tall, 650-pound (294 kg) bronze statue of Mahatma Gandhi appeared to have been sawed off at the ankles and half its face was severed and missing, local news firm Davis Enterprise reported.
The Indian-Americans across the country expressed shock and outrage at the incident and have demanded that the officials investigate it as an incident of hate crime.
The vandalised statue of Mahatma Gandhi was found by a park employee in the early hours of the morning of January 27, the police said. The statue is being removed and will be stored in a safe place until it can be evaluated, said Davis City councilman Lucas Frerichs.
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Investigators are still unsure of when exactly the statue was torn down or what the motive may have been, another local news firm Sacramento Bee reported.
Seeing as it’s a cultural icon to a portion of the people in Davis, we are taking it very seriously, Deputy Chief Paul Doroshov of the Davis Police Department was quoted as saying by the daily.
The statue of Mahatma Gandhi, which was donated by the Indian government to the city of Davis, was installed by the city council four years ago amidst protests from anti-Gandhi and anti-India organisations.
(With agency inputs)