A statue of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, or Mahatma Gandhi, was vandalised at a public park by unidentified persons in Punjab’s Bathinda on Friday, PTI reported.

The Punjab Police said they were examining the close-circuit television camera footage in the area to find the culprits.

Station House Officer (Sadar) Harjot Singh Mann said a case has been filed at the area’s Ramman Mandi Police Station.

Punjab Congress unit chief Amarinder Singh Raja Warring said that the act was unacceptable.

“No words are enough to condemn the act of vandalism and desecration of Mahatma Gandhi Ji’s statue in Bathinda,” Warring tweeted. “Culprits must be identified and brought to book.”

The incident came two days after a statue of Gandhi was defaced at a Hindu temple in Canada’s Ontario city.

Advertisement

Amy Boudreau, a spokesperson for the York Regional Police, had said that unidentified persons defaced the statue by writing the words “rapist” and “Khalistan” on it. The police said that they were considering the incident as one motivated by hate and bias.

Gandhi’s statues outside India have been targeted on at least three previous occasions in the past two years in London, Washington and California’s Davis city.