Date:18/09/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/09/18/stories/2008091850200100.htm

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Shamshabad robbery: gold recovered intact

Staff Reporter

HYDERABAD: Nine days after the sensational robbery of Rs. 1.10 crore worth gold at gunpoint at Rajiv Gandhi International Airport here, Cyberabad police recovered the entire gold intact after arresting three persons in Agra in Uttar Pradesh on Wednesday.

Among the arrested persons was Naval Singh, driver of the Marudhar Courier Company that sent the consignment of the gold from Mumbai to Hyderabad.

The other two accused, Ram Kumar and Vimal Mehra, both unemployed youths in their early 20s, were his relatives.

Naval Singh reportedly used to overhear about the gold consignments being sent and received by the courier company since he was working as driver of its owner here. “Unmindful of the driver’s presence, the owner used to speak about minute details of consignments loudly over the mobile phone,” a police officer explained.

The driver who hails from Agra allegedly plotted to rob the gold and sought help of his relatives, Kumar and Mehra, in Agra. It is not yet confirmed from whom they procured the firearm, but the trio selected September 7 to execute the plan and lay in wait near the airport cargo office.

As the gold was being shifted from one car to another by the courier company staff, the duo wielding a knife and a revolver scared them and drove away the Santro car containing the gold consignment. Special Operations Team of Cyberabad, led by Inspector P. Radha Kishan Rao and SIs -- V. Bhaskar and A. Ram Reddy -- got a tip-off that the offenders fled to Madhya Pradesh.

Pursuing the leads, the SOT first went to Bhopal and from there to Agra in Uttar Pradesh. “Based on the inputs given by SOT, we spread out a dragnet for the trio and first picked up Ram Kumar from his house in Kheraghad of Agra district,” Agra Senior Superintendent of Police, Raghuvir Lal, told The Hindu over phone.

Later, the other two accused were picked up from their respective houses. The entire gold was recovered intact from them who confessed to police that they shared the booty after meeting in Agra.

They were produced before a local magistrate and will be brought to city on a transit warrant.