Police in the southern Indian state of Karnataka say a mass Hindu prayer meeting near a disputed Muslim shrine has passed off peacefully.

The two right wing Hindu groups which organised the meeting had expected twenty five thousand people to attend but only eight thousand turned up.

The groups had been demanding control of the Muslim shrine claiming it was really a shrine of a Hindu god.

Thousands of police were mobilised because of fears of a repeat of the destruction of a mosque in Ayodhya six years ago.