Bhopal, Feb 14 (IANS): Two days after a church was vandalised in Madhya Pradesh's Narmadapuram, police on Tuesday said that they had arrested three accused, including two from neighbouring Uttar Pradesh.

During the interrogation, the trio claimed they were "hurt" over the incident of burning of copies of Ramcharitamanas by activists of an OBC outfit in Lucknow last month, and committed the vandalism as "revenge", a police official said.

According to police, the accused were also planing something big, and they could have targeted some more religious places, but were arrested soon after the incident.

The arrested persons have been identified as Akash Tiwari, 24, of Jhansi and his close friend Avanish Pandey, 28, a resident of Ayodhya, and the third as Shiva Rai, a resident of Narmadapuram.

"Trio have confessed that they were hurt with Lucknow's incident and they wanted to do something for their dharma. They were targetting to vandalise non-Hindu religious places. After torching a church and Christian prayer hall in Narmadapuram district, they had planned to commit similar acts at churches and mazars in Narmadapuram town followed by similar incidents at churches, mazars and mosques in Bhopal," a senior police official told IANS.

The police official further said that Tiwari masterminded the vandalisation of the church hall by sharing actual locations of the targets and also funded the crime, while his friend Pandey, with whom he had studied together and did initial private sector jobs in Lucknow, was living in Itarsi town of Narmadapuram and working as sales executive at a car showroom in Bhopal, executed the plan.

Pandey came to Narmadapuram (MP) in December 2021 for apprenticeship in Railways at Itarsi - a major junction of the West Central Railway). He completed the apprenticeship in December 2022, after which he joined a car showroom in Bhopal as sales executive. Since Bhopal is just 90 odd km from Itarsi, he continued to stay in in Itarsi only and daily shunted between Itarsi and Bhopal.

During the investigation, police found that Pandey had thrown a bottle of liquor inside a church earlier in January but it wasn't reported. On January 9, he burnt the gate of a church and also a copy of the holy Bible in Itarsi's Kheda area, after which the police lodged a case, the official added.

A month later, Pandey convinced Rai to burning furniture and writing 'Ram' on the wall inside a Christian prayer hall in Chauki Pura village under Kesla police station of the district. The incident came to light on Sunday, after the hall was opened for prayers.

"After lodging a case under Section 295 IPC, we formed three teams and following sustained investigation, our teams were able to track two of the accused, including prime accused Avanish and his helper Shiva Rai on Monday late night. Their grilling led to the arrest of Jhansi-based mastermind Tiwari. All three are now in police custody," Narmadapuram SP, Dr Gurkaran Singh said.

Initial questioning of the two arrested men hailing from UP, has revealed that Tiwari not only sent Pandey the Google locations of targets in Narmadapuram and Bhopal, but also transferred money to him for the crime.

While Pandey had received Rs 1,500-Rs 2,000 for throwing a liquor bottle into the church premises, he got Rs 5,000 for burning the gate and a Bible at Kheda church in the town on January 9. Also, while he got Rs 10,000 for burning property and writing 'Ram' inside the Christian prayer hall, Shiva Rai got Rs 5,000 for assisting him.

"We're now trying to ascertain, as to whether Tiwari was paying Pandey money for these acts out of his own pocket or the source of this funding was somewhere else," the SP said.