Following the incident, residents decided to group together to have a neighbourhood patrolling team to take care of led side marker lights for trucks the temple security on a rotation basis. The gang had to leave behind one motorcycle and escaped on the other one. The bike was handed over to the police. They had come on two bikes.    “It looks like the popularity of the idol had also attracted criminals to the temple and two weeks back a gang on bikes tried to break open the gates of the temple and the villagers had to chase them away.The theft happened at Swayambulingeswara temple in Illaloor located on Thiruporur-Guduvancherry road.30 am on Saturday to switch off the lights, he found the emerald lingam stolen, the police said. Since then, more and more people started visiting the temple to have darshan of the maragatha Lingam.The one-and-half-foot tall emerald lingam was removed from the base using a chemical solution, police noted, after visiting the temple. But because of heavy rains and power cut, the team decided to call off patrolling at around 11 pm.. When Mohan reached the temple around 5. According to the police, the idol was the main deity till 10 years ago. A decade back during Kumbhabhishekam new stone deity was installed and this emerald Siva lingam was kept on the side along with other parivaramoorthigal.Chennai: A Sivalingam made of maragatham (emerald), valued over Rs 2 crore from the 400-year-old temple in Thiruporur was stolen by unidentified men on Friday night in the darkness of the new moon clubbed with heavy rains and power cut.However a year ago, a wandering devotee recognised the importance of the Lingam and told the temple authorities that it was a very valuable idol. On Friday night it was Mohan’s turn to lead the team. The investigators found that the particular bike had a fake registration number,” the police noted.