Jamshedpur bank robbery, jeweller loot case cracked, two arrested

Failed robbery at the Muthoot Finance office provides lead

Jamshedpur, Sep 14: With the arrest of two persons, the Jamshedpur police have claimed to have solved the Bank of India’s Ulidih branch robbery involving cash and gold ornaments worth over Rs 1.5 crores and Rs 32 loot from Bistupur jeweller.

The police have arrested Bhagwat Thakur (41) and Khagendra Narayan Singh alias Sonu (30), both residents of Vaishali district and Darbhanga district of Bihar respectively involved in the incident.

Clues from the crime spot followed by a thorough investigation helped the police to solve the bank robbery case committed on August 18.  The main lead was clicked by the arrested robbers involved in the failed robbery at the Muthoot Finance office in Dhanbad on September 6.

The Dhanbad police had prevented the robbery in the finance company office by killing one of the robbers and arresting two from the spot.

As the modus operandi of the Ulidih bank robbery here in Mango and at the finance company office was almost the same, a team of police officials from Jamshedpur had rushed to Dhanbad the same day and had interrogated the two arrested robbers there and had gathered enough information from them regarding the Ulidih robbery before finally arresting two of the robbers.

Sources informed that the same gang was involved in both the robberies.

Revealing the breakthrough, senior SP, Prabhat Kumar said that during the investigation they have concluded that the gang leader Rajiv Singh who is presently lodged in Beur Jail in Patna had carried out the robbery in Ulidih bank from the jail itself by means of his associates operating outside.

“It is very clear now that it was an inter-state gang that had committed the robbery at the Ulidih branch of the Bank of India in Mango on August 18 morning,” said Kumar.

Three other criminals involved in the case have left India with the amount looted in the incident, efforts are being made to arrest them. Efforts are also being made to recover the looted amount and gold.

The senior SP said six robbers had come in a container from Patna and parked the vehicle somewhere between Chandil and Jamshedpur along the NH-33 and had reached Ulidih by riding two stolen bikes. Having committed the crime, they had travelled by the same container before abandoning it at an isolated place in Kolkata, ” narrated Kumar.

The senior police officer said that the robbers had decamped with Rs 33.5 lakhs cash and gold ornaments weighing over two kgs worth Rs 1.13 crores from the Ulidih branch of the Bank of India.

He pointed out the police succeeded to recover Rs 6,000 from the container driver who had been paid Rs 20,000 as his remuneration. He said the rest of the cash and gold ornaments have been taken out of the country and an attempt to get them back is on.

SSP said during interrogation those arrested confessed that it was the gang of Rajiv Singh which had looted Rs 32 lakhs from a Bistupur-based jeweller on February 14 this year.

Two criminals had looted Rs 32 lakh from the two staff of the city-based jewelry showroom, Chhaganlal Dayaljee Sons, at the entrance gate of Gajraj Mansion in Bistupur on 14^th February last.