Date:27/11/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/11/27/stories/2008112752750500.htm

Andhra Pradesh - Hyderabad

Trader robbed of Rs. 5.5-lakh gold

Staff Reporter

Three tricksters pose as policemen doing the frisking job

HYDERABAD: Three men posing as policemen made off with gold jewellery worth Rs. 5.5 lakh after diverting attention of a trader in the name of checking his bag in old city on Wednesday.

Nitayi Bera, a gold jewellery maker, started from his house in Anand Galli near Charminar on foot to take an auto-rickshaw to reach Mahatma Gandhi Bus Station carrying the jewellery and clothes in a bag around 10 a.m. He was supposed to deliver the ornaments to traders in Vijayawada.

Ask for victim’s bag

A stranger approached him as he reached Mahboob Ka Mehindi locality and asked him to accompany him saying: “Our sirs are standing there and calling you.” When he went to the two persons standing in a corner, they told him they wanted to check his bag claiming to be police officials. The duo maintained that subjecting people to frisking and checking had become impertinent in the backdrop of frequent bomb blasts across the country. The unsuspecting Bera told them that he was carrying gold jewellery. “Who needs your gold? All that we are interested in is public safety,” they said. In the name of checking the bag, they apparently stole the jewellery kept in a plastic box beneath the clothes and returned the bag to him and rode off on two bikes.

Bera felt inspection of the bag was bad omen and returned home cancelling his journey.

On reaching home, he opened the bag only to realise that the ‘policemen’ took him for a ride. He told the Charminar police, who registered a case of theft and cheating and that he could recognise the tricksters. He suspected the role of his workers in masterminding the theft.