Five men who had stolen around Rs 17 lakh in cash and diamond and solitaire jewellery from east Delhi were nabbed from the jungle areas of Balasore near Cuttack in Odisha. The stolen goods have been recovered from them.
The gang posed as servants to gain access to houses and burgled them. They had targeted several houses in Delhi-NCR, said joint commissioner (eastern range) Ravindra Yadav.
Investigations started after a burglary was reported from Priyadarshini Vihar on the intervening night of December 4 and 5. The owner of the house, Tapan Mehndiratta, had gone to dinner at his relative’s house in Karol Bagh with his family. They had left the house in the care of their servant Subrata Malik.
Mehndiratta had kept money received from sale of property in a locked room. When the family returned, they found both the money and servant missing. “CCTV footage showed Malik leaving the house around an hour after the family had left for dinner. His phone was switched off,” Yadav said.
Police soon recovered Malik’s phone from an auto driver near Preet Vihar who claimed that he had found it lying on the road.
“The friends and relatives of the servant were questioned after which it appeared that Malik may have fled to his native village. A team soon left for Odisha. After getting on-ground information and technical inputs from Delhi, the five men were nabbed from various locations in Odisha between December 15-17 with cash and jewellery,” DCP (east) Omvir Singh said.
Explaining the modus operandi, Singh said that some of the gang members would find found jobs at affluent houses as servants or guards. The others came to Delhi two months later. They would communicate with the help of cheap phones, stay at lodges and recce the area before striking. After the heist, they would destroy the SIM and handsets and leave the city.