Hazaribag: Two Buddhist monks and a nun of Japan have been beaten up and robbed of their belongings at Atka village on the border of Giridh and Hazaribag districts in Jharkhand.

A group of miscreants attacked the vehicle, in which Eishiama (55), Hakko (76) and Tshyama (65-nun) were returning to Kolkata by road on October 25 night after attending the 34th Vishwa Santi Stupa ceremony at Rajgir, deputy inspector general B B Pradhan said.

The Gaya airport authorities provided a 'Sumo' to the monks, as the plane for Kolkata could not take off due to inclement weather, Pradhan said.

When their vehicle reached at Atka in Giridh district, they found some road blockades and as soon as the local driver got down to remove them a dozen miscreants pounced on them and thrashed them all before fleeing with their bags which contained passports, camera, travel documents and air tickets from Kolkata to Bangkok and Bangkok to Australia.

Pradhan said the two monks and the nun carried on with their onward journey without informing the local police.

They got to know only when the Kolkata police informed the Hazaribag and Giridh police after the monks registered their complaints to their embassy through the Kolkata airport authorities on October 26.

Giridh superintendent of police Deepak Verma confirmed the incident and raids had been carried out to nab the culprits, Pradhan said and added on the basis of the fax report sent by Kolkata police, a first information report (FIR) had been filed into the incident.

PTI