As Soraya Lennie explains, the case has shocked the country and sparked accusations of a three-decade old cover up, Al Jazeera and DW reported.

After the allegations leveled by the former sanitation worker at Dharmasthala temple, local authorities have opened an investigation.

Located in India s southern state of Karnataka, the temple is a popular destination for pilgrims.

The former worker’s confessions have unveiled a scandal involving allegations of hundreds of murders and rapes.

On July 3, the former sanitation worker, who belongs to the Dalit community — a historically marginalized group from the lowest level of India s centuries-old discriminatory caste hierarchy, made a statement to police.

"I am filing this complaint with an extremely heavy heart and to recover from an insurmountable sense of guilt ... I can no longer bear the burden of memories of the murders I witnessed, the continuous death threats to bury the corpses I received, and the pain of beatings — that if I did not bury those corpses, I would be buried alongside them," the statement said.

The man said that he worked at the Dharmasthala temple between 1995 and 2014.

He said he carried out much of his daily cleaning duties near the Nethravathi River, which flows close to the Dharmasthala temple—until things took a dark turn.

In his complaint, he said he started to "notice dead bodies appearing" near the river.

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"Among them, women s bodies were more numerous," the report stated.

The man initially thought the bodies were the tragic results of suicide and drowning. However, he soon realized he was mistaken.

"Many female corpses were found without clothes or undergarments," he said in his statement.

"Some corpses showed clear signs of sexual assault and violence — injuries or strangulation marks indicating violence were visible on those bodies."

Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah says his government will not succumb to any kind of pressure in the investigation of the case.

The whistleblower said he was forced to dispose of hundreds of bodies, many of whom appeared to be minor girls, according to DW report.

"She was wearing a school uniform shirt. However, her skirt and undergarments were missing. Her body showed clear signs of sexual assault," according to his complaint. "There were strangulation marks on her neck. They instructed me to dig a pit and bury her along with her school bag."

The man also wrote about "extremely cruel" murders that took place in the town near the temple.

"Poor and destitute men who came for begging in the Dharmasthala area were systematically murdered … They would be tied to chairs in rooms and suffocated from behind using towels. These murders took place in my presence," he said.

The man alleged that his temple supervisors did not report the cases to authorities. Instead, he claimed that they beat him up and forced him to "to secretly dispose of these bodies."

He alleged that his supervisor threatened him by saying: "We will cut you into pieces; your body will also be buried like the other corpses. We will sacrifice all your family members."

He described how he escaped from Dharmasthala in 2014. He said that after a minor girl in his family was allegedly sexually harassed by a person thought to be connected to the temple supervisors.

Indian Dalit women, girls targeted by upper-caste rapists

A spokesperson for Dharmasthala, K. Parshwanath Jain, said that the temple administration supported a "fair and transparent investigation."