Three accused held last week in connection with the Nashik arms haul case allegedly told their interrogators that they stole the guns from Uttar Pradesh because they planned to start their own gang in Mumbai. The Nashik rural police on Tuesday made two more arrests in connection with the case from Mumbai.
The trio was on their way to Mumbai via the Mumbai–Agra highway and were intercepted at Chandwad in Nashik in the early hours of Friday. The police recovered a range of guns and over 4,000 rounds of live ammunition from the Mahindra Bolero that they were driving.
The police said that Badruddin Badshah, the alleged leader of the gang, was a repeat offender. Since 2012 he had been in and out of prison, where he came into contact with several underworld operators.
An officer said, “ Badshah hit upon the idea of forming his own gang around a month ago after frequent interactions with other history-sheeters he met in prison. He told his associates that all the gangsters who once ruled Mumbai are now either abroad, in prison. He felt that the time was ripe for a new gang to take over the reins. He said he wanted to form his own gang called the Badshah Company.”
Badshah and his co accused, all residents of Mumbai, decided to start off with extortion and then kill a couple of businessmen and builders. The officer said, “They realised they needed weapons. So instead of buying them in the illegal arms market, they decided to steal them from an authorised arms dealership in U.P.”
