The Uttar Pradesh Police has arrested a Bajrang Dal member and is searching for eight others who are accused of demolishing a two-century-old shrine in Fatehpur’s Mawai village on Tuesday, the Hindustan Times reported.

The arrested man, identified as Narendra Hindu, has been produced before a court. Narendra is the Bhitoora block coordinator of the Bajrang Dal.

The shrine of Wali Shah Baba, located in a predominantly Hindu area, had been partially damaged during previous road work and repaired by residents. Villagers alleged that a group of about 24 men demolished the structure on Tuesday with hammers, spades and sticks, while making references to Bangladesh.

Alok Pandey, the station house officer at the Husainaganj police station, said that the incident came to light after a video of the demolition was widely circulated on social media.

A first information report was subsequently filed against five named persons and four others who remain unidentified, based on a complaint by a sub-inspector, the Hindustan Times reported.

The men were accused of damaging the shrine, delivering communally provocative speeches, disturbing social harmony and hurting religious sentiments, according to the newspaper.

The FIR was registered under Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita sections pertaining to rioting, injuring or defiling a place of worship, trespassing on burial places, promoting enmity, hatred, or ill-will between different religious, linguistic or caste groups, and mischief.

“One person has been arrested and sent to jail,” the Hindustan Times quoted Pandey as saying. “Action against others named in the FIR is in progress.”

According to local revenue records, the structure, which measures about 10-12 square metres, is not officially recognised as a shrine, the newspaper reported.

Amresh Kumar Singh, the tehsildar of Sadar, said that the “so-called shrine had been constructed several years ago on land recorded as part of the village settlement”. He added that the surrounding area was inhabited by Hindu families.

Members of the Bajrang Dal claimed that the shrine was linked to a land dispute, the Hindustan Times reported.

Virendra Pandey, a provincial coordinator of the Hindutva group, claimed that the structure was being used to assert ownership of the land. “Some bricks were removed, but there was no shrine,” the newspaper quoted Virendra Pandey as saying. “Residents cleared the site themselves.”