April 12, 2007	Thursday	Rabi-ul-Awwal 23, 1428

JAMMU: A man sliced off his tongue at a Hindu temple and offered it to the Hindu goddess of revenge, police said on Wednesday. Suresh Kumar, 24, told police in a written statement late on Tuesday that he had seen visions of the goddess Kali -- the most fearsome of Hindu deities -- in his dreams.

Kumar, a supervisor at a government employment centre, wrote that he had been worshipping the goddess known as "the black one with the red tongue" in a search for justice after his elder brother was murdered in September 2005.

On Tuesday, Kumar, from Seot village, 28 kilometres from Jammu, the winter capital of occupied Kashmir, went to pray at the popular Mahakali temple.

Once inside, he took out a sharp knife and presented his bloody tongue to priests to make an offering to Kali.

The priests and shocked devotees called police and Kumar was rushed to the hospital, a police spokesman said.—AFP