3 held for robbery, jewellery seized

Hyderabad: Three days after a jeweller was robbed by an armed gang which threatened him with a revolver, the South Zone police arrested three people including a gems trader.

Cops said the gang from Odisha pretended to be customers and looted the victim while he was alone at the shop. They had procured the weapon from Odisha. The cops recovered gems and jewellery worth around Rs 5 lakh.

The arrested men are Gautham Lenka, 26, a jeweller and gems trader from Jayachandrapur of Kendrapada district in Odisha, Bhaskar Mitra, 27, a construction worker from Balangir, Odisha, Siddeshwar Ram, 25, a farmer from the Mayurbhanj district of Odisha.

DCP Satyanarayana said the accused Gautham and his friend Ramakant had business transactions with the victim Dinesh Soni through a person named Qamar.
“Gautham had earlier visited the shop four to five times and observed that Dinesh was often alone in the shop. He then hatched a plan to rob him with his aides,” said the DCP.

During interrogation, police found that two months back, Gautham had procured a country revolver from his friend named Silpath Tharu Swain, from Odisha. Silpath had earlier taken shelter in his village after several criminal activities.

On Sunday at around 1.30 pm, Gautham called the victim and asked to open his shop as he was coming for business. At about 1.50 pm when the complainant was alone in his shop the trio entered the shop, tied his legs and hands and sealed his mouth with adhesive tape.

They pointed the revolver at him, took the valuables, locked the shop from outside and fled on the victim’s bike, police said. They abandoned the bike on High Court Road and escaped.