Odisha Police arrests 4 Russians for flying drone over Jagannath Temple in Puri

Four Russian nationals including three women were detained by Odisha Police on Tuesday for flying a drone equipped with a camera capable of taking high-definition images over the Sri Jagannath Temple in Odisha’s Puri on Thursday.

Puri Police said, the detained claimed that they were members of ISKCON.

A senior police officer said, the four devotees from the ISKCON were operating drone from roof of Radha Ballav Mutt, located a few meters away from the temple.

Sarthak Sarangi, SP Puri, said, “The four were questioned and later released on personal bonds.”

He added that the four told the questioning team that they were unaware of the no-flying rules in the area.

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“The Russians also told the questioning team that they were trying to photograph the shrine for creating roadmap to the temple,” added the SP.

The Puri administration had declared the area a ‘no flying zone’ in 2014 after a quadcopter took werial videos and photographs of the temple an uploaded them on social media. Since then a patrolling team has been deployed to keep a tab on to prevent flying of UAV in the area.