Hyderabad: Gang Posing as CBI officials Loot 46 Kg of Gold Ornaments from Muthoot Finance

In a daring daylight-heist, a five-member gang committed robbery in Muthoot Finance at its Beeramguda branch in Sangaeddy district on Tuesday night   and escaped with 46 kilos of gold worth Rs.12 crore. On receipt of information,  Cyberabad  Commissioner of Police Sandeep Sandilya rushed to the scene of offence along with Sangareddy DSP Chandrashekhar Reddy and constituted five special teams to nab the culprits. The police teams spread a dragnet all along the route from Patancheru to Zaheerabad and organized intensive checks. According to the police, the gang, believed to be members of the Padri gang belonging to Maharashtra, had come in a red-colored Scorpio car. The gang barged into the finance company stating that they were CBI officials and had come to make a surprise check of all records and locker rooms. Once the locker rooms were opened, the culprits brandished guns and threatened the company staff and locked them up in a bathroom. After collecting the mortgaged gold ornaments and also some cash, the gang made good their escape in the car. They were also stated to have carried away the CCTV footage and hard discs besides the cameras. What shocked the people in the area and even the police authorities is that a few years back, a similar robbery took place very near today’s scene of crime. In the earlier incident, some members of a terrorist outfit, who had escaped from a jail, had raided Muthoot Mini Fin Corp and committed robbery. The culprits were later killed in a police encounter. According to some eye witnesses, the Hindi-speaking gang members escaped in the car towards Hyderabad. The police officials, who visited the scene of offence, found that the CCTV cameras fitted on the premises were missing. While one version is that the CCTV cameras were carried away by the culprits, the police suspect that the cameras might have been removed prior to the gang committing the robbery. This led to the assumption that the whole operation might have been well-planned by the gang and the complicity of some staff of the finance company is not ruled out in the matter. Four staff members of the company were now being questioned by the investigating officers. As the news about the robbery spread, customers, who had mortgaged their gold ornaments to take loans from the company, gathered before the premises and protested demanding that their jewellery must be returned forthwith. They questioned the company authorities as to how such a robbery could have been committed by persons posing as CBI officials. The agitated customers suspect that there might be something more to it than meets the eye in the entire robbery drama and wanted a thorough probe into the matter. Police said that five   offenders came inside the office of muthoot finance, Beeramguda. One of the Offender was dressed like sardarji, and took the name of surjeet patel.  He was wearing black safari dress. The second Offender initially wore black mask, later took it out, and he  was having monkey cap – light rose color. The third  offender was  in Traffic cop getup, wearing a  White shirt and light black trouser,  the fourth  Offender was  in  Light brown safari;  and the  fifth offender  was wearing military cap and a  jungle cap. (NSS)