Representational pic.

Namita Bajpai  |  Express News Service  |  Lucknow | 18th April 2017:: Six tourists from Kerala were detained in Ayodhya by the district police from the vicinity of the disputed site for clicking photographs in the prohibited area on Tuesday afternoon.

According to police sources, of the six, four were Muslims and two Christians. All the six were in police custody and the verification of their identities was underway by cops. However, a team of anti-terror squad along with other senior officers rushed to Ayodhya to interrogate them.

“While the identity of the two persons has been established, the process for the other four is ongoing,” said Anant Deo, senior superintendent of police, Faizabad. After the interrogation and verification of their documents, one person was identified as a former advocate of Kerala High Court while another as retired sub-inspector of Kerala police. The verification of four other persons was underway till filing of this report.

According to SSP, an interpreter was arranged to facilitate the interrogation as none of the six was able to converse in Hindi. However, during the interrogation, they were believed to have told the cops that they had been on a tour to Kathmandu and while on their way back, they stopped in Ayodhya to see the temple town.

When asked why they were taking pictures of the prohibited area, they said that there was no such signage showing it to be a prohibited area and saying that photography was prohibited there.