Jewellery theft probe unearths bigger gold racket in Anantapur

Eight held, 2.5 kg of gold seized; police alert I-T Dept. on another 2.5 kg of unaccounted for gold with two traders

Anantapur district police personnel cracked the gold theft case of Tadipatri town by arresting eight persons involved in it and recovered 2.5 kg of gold jewellery, six two-wheelers and nine cellular phones on Thursday. The value of the recovered material was more than ₹1 crore, Superintendent of Police B. Satya Yesu Babu told reporters here.

Tadipatri police personnel led by Deputy Superintendent of Police A. Srinivasulu not only cracked the theft case but also busted illegal gold jewellery trade running in the district. They coordinated with the Income Tax officials and provided them information regarding unaccounted for gold jewellery weighing more than 5 kg, which is valued at more than ₹2 crore.

Three persons on a two-wheeler snatched a bag containing 3 kg of gold jewellery from businessmen Shafi and Abdul Rahim hailing from Nellore, in Tadipatri on January 28 in broad daylight. The traders immediately lodged a complaint with the local police leading to this recovery in three weeks, the SP said.

Meticulous plan

The businessmen were in Tadipatri to sell gold ornaments to different outlets on January 27 and 28, and they were among many such agents who supply gold and gold ornaments to local retailers. The key accused and leader of the eight-member gang, Nasiruddin Shabbir, was an accountant in Meda Jewellers in Tadipatri town and he knew people who sold gold without proper documents. He planned to rob such gold from the two brothers (businessmen) from Nellore as he thought they could not complain to the police, the DSP said.

Mr. Shabbir along with his friends Talari Sudhir Kumar and Mohammed Maqdoom, who were all in need of quick money to finance their vices and luxuries, came together to hatch the meticulous theft plan proposed by Shabbir and roped in five others to execute it. They formed into three teams and the first one was a pick-up party, the second one information party and the third set took care of coordination and monitoring.

While the information party members Manjula Anjaneyulu, 24, and Singamaneni Harikrishna, 24, kept a watch on the movement of the businessmen duo, coordination team members T. Sudhir Kumar, 24, Shabbir, 33, and Maqdoom, 33, watched the surroundings of the path the duo took while going to a hotel for lunch and passed on the information to pick-up team members Gooty Mallikarjun, 26, Koppulakrishna Mohan Reddy, 24, and Mallayyagari Muniswamy, 23.

After snatching the bag, the three fled to Kasapuram village and got themselves tonsured there at a temple to change their look. However, the police noticed the movement of Shabbir and two other gang members to and fro several times at one of the gold shops in CCTV cameras where the theft had taken place and cracked the mystery.