Date:02/09/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/09/02/stories/2008090257560100.htm

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Armed dacoits strike in Gurgaon

Staff Reporter

Former DIG’s family taken hostage; cash, jewellery looted in midnight operation

GURGAON: Half-a-dozen dacoits armed with country-made pistols and knives took the family of a former Deputy Inspector-General of the Railway Protection Force hostage in their DLF Phase III home here on Monday and decamped with jewellery and cash.

The dacoits, wearing masks and gloves, broke into the house through a window on the ground floor in the wee hours of the morning and headed straight for the bedroom where former DIG R.K. Kharbanda and his wife Lalita were sleeping.

“When I got up on hearing the noise,” recalled Mr. Kharbanda later in the day, “I found myself surrounded by about half-a-dozen young men carrying firearms and knives. They gagged me and tied my hands and legs. They tied up my wife as well and took the keys of the wardrobe from her.”

“I am a heart patient and had problem breathing as they gagged me. When I pleaded with them, they removed the cloth and warned me not to raise an alarm. Initially I offered some resistance, but gave up after they punched me in the face and trained a pistol at my temple. They were armed and I thought it wiser to acquiesce to their demands,” said the 85-year-old Mr. Kharbanda who has been living in Gurgaon for the past eight years.

The dacoits then turned to an adjacent bedroom and took a relative of Mr. Kharbanda hostage at gunpoint. The relative had come to visit the family a few days ago.

“The dacoits then took our relative to the bedroom upstairs at gunpoint and forced my son to open the door. They then tied him up as well as his wife and daughter and ransacked their wardrobe. They took away some jewellery, a few thousand rupees in cash and four cell phones,” said Mr. Kharbanda.

Before breaking into the house, the dacoits had reportedly tied up the area security guard and dumped him into a pit.Later in the day the police said they had vital leads and the case would be worked out soon.

“A gang with a similar modus operandi had committed a robbery in Palam Vihar this past month. It is also active in some neighbouring areas and has struck a few times. The same gang seems to be behind the present incident. We have some leads and are working on them,” said a senior police officer.