Kalaburagi (Karnataka): A new incident of fraud has come to light in Kalaburagi's famous Sukshethra Deval Gangapura Dattatreya temple. It was revealed that the temple priests created fake websites to cheat devotees of crores of rupees by asking them to donate money towards the various religious rituals that take place in the temple.
The temple is located in the Afzalpur taluk of Karnataka's Kalaburagi district and functions under the Muzrai Department of the Karnataka state government. The temple has an official website called www.devalganagapur.com (shridatttreyatemple.ghanagapur). However, the priests working in the temple created another website, www.ghanagapurtemple@gmail.com along with seven other fraudulent websites in order to scam the devotees by asking for donations.
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Although the scam came to light very recently, some temple priests had been duping devotees by asking them for donations for the past five to six years. The fraud was unearthed by DC Yashwant Gurukar, the President of the Temple Development Committee. He had come to the temple grounds for a visit on June 21, when he discovered the temple priests had been using fake websites to receive donations.
After a complaint was lodged by the DC, the Deval Ganagapura police filed an FIR against seven priests of the temple. In addition to duping countless devotees of crores of rupees, some priests have also managed to put the Karnataka state government at loss as well. The donation amount requested by the priests was almost ten times the actual cost, said the police.
