Jain monk found hanging in Bihar temple premises

A Jain monk was found hanging from the ceiling fan inside a temple premises here, police said Wednesday.

The body of Vipran Sagar Maharaj (36) was found hanging from a ceiling fan in one of the rooms situated inside the Champapur Digambar Jain temple, Superintendent of Police, City, Bhagalpur, Rajvansh Singh said.

He said the monk's body has been sent for post-mortem and investigations were on to ascertain whether it was a case of suicide.

The monk was a resident of Damoh district in Madhya Pradesh and had arrived here about six months ago along with some other wandering ascetics, the temple's security guard Dhanraj Singh said.

The security guard said he found the monk's body hanging from the ceiling fan Tuesday evening after breaking open the door of Maharaj's quarters when he did not turn up to hold discourses for his followers at the appointed time.

The temple's secretary general Sunil Kumar Jain said the last rites will be performed as per tradition and the deceased monk will be given "samadhi" inside the premises.