Four people were arrested in Mardan on Saturday after they destroyed a life-size statue of Buddha on the orders of a local prayer leader, reported 24NewsHD TV channel.
The rare Buddha statue was vandalised in the Takht Bai area of Mardan after being accidentally recovered during routine excavation work.
The locals not only followed the cleric’s directive without any question but also filmed the destruction of the precious statue.
Your nikah (wedlock) would cease to exist and you will no more be a believer if the statue isn’t disposed of, the prayer leader told the people.
It can be seen in the video that the statute was recovered in a good condition from the property of a local Jamal Khan but the people hammered it into pieces within no time.
https://twitter.com/NaPoha_/status/1284387697616773120
Earlier the police were slow to react to the news. However, when the social media exploded with reactions from a large number of people criticising the incident, the police swung into action and made the arrests.
Takht Bai is known around the world for being the main cradle of the Buddhist civilisation, especially the Buddhist monastery which is included in the World Heritage List. As a result, relics are regularly found in the area by locals because the entire area was once a centre of this civilisation.
In 2001, the entire world was shocked when the Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar ordered to destroy the two famous Buddha statues in Bamiyan province of central Afghanistan.
Meanwhile, this vandalism triggered a strong reaction on social media as people from different walks of life criticised the culprits. They said the Archaeology Department must take control of the site as there was a real possibility of more statues and other archaeological remains found there.