With the arrest of four persons on Saturday, the Gurugram police has cracked the sensational heist at Manappuram Finance ltd gold loan branch in which 33 kg of gold worth Rs 10 crore and Rs 7.8 lakh in cash were looted by eight assailants.
Police are looking for the rest of the gang that robbed the gold-loan company’s New Railway Road branch on February 9 and injured two persons during the robbery.
As per the police, 30 kg of gold worth Rs 9 crore that had been placed in 829 pouches and some cash have been seized.
Two pistols, four live cartridges and two motorbikes have also been recovered from the possession of the four men.
The police are yet to recover the remaining three kilograms of gold and cash from the accused.
The city police will produce the four men in court and will take them on remand for recovery and arrest of their associates.
The police arrested the accused at around 12 noon on Saturday from Sector-29 of Gurugram. The culprits were living in a paying guest accommodation in DlF Phase-III.
The arrested robbers are Devendra alias Deva (24) of Jind, Haryana, Hoshiyaar Singh alias Manoj Saini (29) of Farrukhnagar, Gurugram, Vikas Gupta (29) of Kidvai Nagar, Kanpur and Bijendra alias Chabilla (26) of Jind, Haryana.
“We have traced them on the basis of human intelligence and technical surveillance. The footage of the robbery that was captured by the CCTV cameras was a big help in identifying and arresting them.
“Immediately after the crime, they rushed to their accommodation in an autorickshaw and on two bikes. One of the accused, Devendra fled to Ahmedabad, Gujarat by flight to meet a female friend. One of our police teams arrested him there,” Gurugram Police Commissioner Sandeep Khirwar said.
“Around ten Gurugram police teams were involved in the case to nab all the accused, under the observation of DCP Crime, Sumit Kuhar.
“The accused arrested in Gurugram were roaming around the city with the gold, as they were trying to sell it,” he added.
“We will also contact the Uttar Pradesh police because the accused also had some connections in UP. Maybe we will get some record from there,” he said.
letter to the branch
“We have also written a letter to Manappuram Finance ltd and other agencies to ramp up their security. In this branch, only two guards were deployed whereas their figure should be four to five. We have asked them to beef up their security so that such crimes don’t take place in future,” a senior police official said.
Modus Operandi
Police said 15 days ago Devendra had conducted a recce of one of the Manappuram branches in Gurugram. later he contacted Vikas from Kanpur. Vikas involved five of his associates from UP in the plan and robbed the branch.
Sources said that the gang came in an auto and two bikes to rob the branch.
The auto driver, who was told by the gang to wait till they returned, claimed that he did not know what they were up to.
The gang took only 30 minutes to commit the crime and flee from the spot.
Sources said, the gang members didn’t cover their faces because they had planned to destroy the CCTV DVR that has all the recordings. But they were unable do so as they were unable to locate the equipment in the branch.
later the police found that the DVR of the branch was situated in their head office in Kerala.
However, the police are yet to confirm whether the accused have some criminal records or not. All the accused are graduates and they wanted to earn quick money and pay off their debts.
Sources said Devendra, who masterminded the robbery, had lost around Rs 20 lakh in betting and was unable to return the amount which prompted him to hatch the plot.
Khirwar said he will refer the names of the officers who cracked the case to DGP Haryana for a reward.
DCP Crime Sumit Kuhar, ACP Crime Sanjeev Balhara, Inspector Ajay Kumar, Inspector Narendra Chauhan and SIT officers were involved in the case.