Burglary at Nizam's Museum: Duo buried booty near a dairy farm
As per their plan, Ghouse went to the museum and observed the location of the gold tiffin box.
Hyderabad: A week after the sensational burglary at the H.E.H Nizam Museum, in which two men broke in and decamped with precious artefacts, the Hyderabad police have cracked the case and nabbed the two men on Monday night.
According to the police, Mohd Mubeen, the 24-year- old mastermind, visited the museum 45 days prior to the date of the theft to check it out as CC cameras auto-erase the data every 30 days.
He noticed the poor security and talked his childhood friend and habitual offender, Mohd Ghouse Pasha into helping him to steal the artefacts.
Police Commissioner of Hyderabad Anjani Kumar said, “Mohd Mubeen, after returning from Saudi Arabia, happened to visit the Nizam museum and was amused by seeing the precious artefacts gold tiffin box, gold cup and saucer, gold spoon and the gold casing of the Holy Quran. He discussed committing the theft with Ghouse.”
He planned to use his international connections to dispose of the stolen objects.
As per their plan, Ghouse went to the museum and observed the location of the gold tiffin box. As the museum spreads over a long corridor, in order to avoid confusion, he fixed the landmark by identifying a dried up tree which is opposite the location of the tiffin box.
After three days, the duo came in the night and did a recce of the entire premises and surroundings and the location of CCTV cameras. On the same day, they put an ‘arrow’ mark over the ventilator through which they had to enter the museum and over the parapet wall corresponding to the ventilator.
“They also analysed which tools would be useful to them in the commission of the offence and on the day of the offence, they carried three screwdrivers, cutting pliers, nail pullers, ten hacksaw blades and rope for removing the ventilator and getting into the museum from the top. They tied about 30 knots all over a rope for a grip and wore hand gloves to avoid fingerprints and masks to avoid identification,” said the Additional Commissioner of Task Force Police, Chaitanya Kumar.
They planned to enter the museum through the route devoid of CCTV cameras, but failed to get into the museum. Finally they reached the museum through Mata-ki-khidki side on a bike and this was captured in the CCTV footage.
They reached the roof of the museum from the terrace of a neighbouring house whose wall abutted the wall of the museum.
“They carefully removed the ventilator and as Mubeen glided down with the rope, Ghouse tied one end of the rope to the parapet wall and the other end to Mubeen’s waist and released him slowly inside the museum through the ventilator. While getting down, he damaged the camera inside the museum which is right beneath the ventilator. He then took out the gold tiffin box, gold cup and saucer and gold spoon from the showcase, put them in a bag and climbed up using the rope, which was pulled by Ghouse from the other end. They exited the museum through the same route used for entry,” said Mr Kumar.
To avoid being tracked by police on CCTV cameras, they avoided main roads and moved through by-lanes haphazardly and reached Muthangi in Sangareddy district located on the Mumbai highway.
The police commissioner said that at Muthangi ORR, they changed their route and took a service road along the ORR and travelled towards Hyderabad, to show police tracking them on CCTV that they had left the city.
Fearing that they might be caught with the goods they dug a pit in an open area near a dairy farm at Rajendranagar and buried the stolen property there. The police however
tracked it down and retrieved the artefacts. The two were arrested late Monday night and handed over to the Mirchowk police.
Mr Kumar said that the stolen booty will be hand over to the court to be returned to the museum.