People from across the state have been thronging a stone quarry in Rajasthan’s Tonk district after some 4th and 5th century gold coins were discovered from the site in October. Police have now launched a massive hunt to retrieve the gold coins.
Cops have been, for the past few days, doing rounds of the Janakipura and adjoining areas, asking the villagers to return the hidden treasure they have scoured from the site, reports Hindustan Times.
Two Archaeologists from the Jaipur branch of Archaeological Survey of India who were set to determine the value of the two coins recovered from a jeweler said that the coins belonged to the times of Samudragupta (335-380AD) and Kumaragupta (414-485 AD). The ASI team suspects that someone could have buried the gold coins near the quarry.
Police believes that the villagers have scoured nearly 2000 coins from the quarry and are dead set on recovering them. They have been carrying out frequent raid in surrounding areas and are shielding the quarry to prevent further scouring.
Preeti Jain, the district superintendent of police, told the newspaper that the coins are government property and they will book cases against those who refuse to return them.
The situation might have died down for now but villagers say that the gold rush has not ceased but merely interrupted by the authorities.
(Feature image source: Reuters)