A fortnight after a private firm’s diamonds and diamond-studded pendants worth Rs. 6.49 crore were robbed, city police on Monday claimed to have cracked the case with the arrest of six accused, including a woman, and recovered valuables worth over Rs. five crore.
Udaybhan Singh, Om Prakash Singh, Rajesh Saroj, Dhiraj Singh, Bipin Singh and Savitri Thakur were arrested from the city and neighbouring Thane district, Joint Police Commissioner (Crime) Sadanand Date said.
“Eighty per cent of the valuables were recovered from the accused. The accused were produced before a court which remanded them in police custody till June 5,” Date said.
Savitri was arrested while the rest were apprehended yesterday, Date added.
According to police, complainant Ramesh Kumar Gupta, security supervisor at SR Securities, and three others had on May 9 arrived at Borivali railway station by train from Surat, carrying the consignment of diamonds belonging to Malka Amit JK Logistics.
SR Security had been hired to transport its goods, and this particular consignment was to be delivered to the firm’s branch at the Bandra-Kurla Complex.
The police said Gupta’s colleague and accused Udaybhan Singh, a driver with the security picked him up and others in a vehicle from Borivali railway station, drove them up to the National Park and stopped there saying that tyres were damaged.
IPS officer Date said that around 4 pm a group of men who were carrying guns and some sharp weapons got into the vehicle and threatened Gupta and his colleagues. Uday Singh had also connived with them.
Date further added, “Uday Singh then drove them to Virar in neighbouring Thane district where he and his associates abandoned the vehicle and fled with the consignment.”
“During the probe, it was found that Uday Singh already had criminal cases registered against him in the past. Acting on information, all the six were arrested from different places for their roles in the robbery case,” Date said, without elaborating the role of each of the accused in the crime.
