2 killed, 6 injured as ISKCON temple wall caves in

Two persons, including a seven-year old girl, were killed and six others injured when a compound wall of the ISKCON temple collapsed and fell on an abutting slum on the city outskirts today, police said.

Five huts were damaged as the wall built "illegally" around the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON) temple off Kanakapura road caved in, ACP (Law and Order) Kamal Pant told PTI here.

Bodies of seven-year-old Jaya and forty-year-old Channagiriappa were extricated from the debris, he said adding heavy overnight rains might have triggered the wall collapse.
The injured have been admitted to a nearby hospital and the nature of their injuries was not serious, he added.

Karnataka Home Minister K J George, local MLA Krishnappa and Bangalore Mayor B S Sathyanarayana, rushed to the site and supervised the rescue and relief operations.
Speaking to reporters, Sathyanarayana warned of strict action against ISKCON temple authorities for "illegally" putting up the wall adjacent to the slum. "It (wall) is illegal. We will take action," he said.

ISKCON spokesperson Bharata Rshabha Das announced a relief of Rs five lakh and Rs 50,000 to the kins of the dead and the injured respectively.

Das said the temple authorities were looking into the cause of the wall collapse. He alleged that some people living in the slum had used the adjacent ISKCON wall to build their houses.

The slum-dwellers protested and raised slogans against the temple authorities.