Surat police arrest 12 in diamond loot case

SURAT: With the arrest of 12 miscreants, including six of an Agra-based gang, the city police on Sunday claimed to have cracked the sensational diamond robbery which took place on October 7 last. Police has also recovered diamonds, vehicles and cash amounting to Rs 41.21 lakh from the accused held in the case.
Two employees of a diamond firm were attacked by three unidentified persons near Umiyadham and a bag containing diamonds worth Rs 50 lakh snatched from them.
The diamond robbery, conducted in broad day light, had sent shock waves through the diamond industry and with no clinching evidences left behind by the culprits, police had to grope in the dark for nearly three months.
However, police were on trail of some four gangs with track-record of such offences and even unearthed another diamond loot case of Rs 7.50 lakh in the process. Three miscreants, namely Harsukh Patel, Mangalsinh Gaiga and Kalu Gaiga were nabbed in the raid in Umergaon in Valsad, said police commissioner V K Gupta here.
Around Diwali last year, the crime branch was tipped about the involvement of one Narsinh Naran Patel and Ranchhod Dhola in the diamond loot case at Umiyadham.
A close watch was being kept at their residences in Katargam and their movements were being tracked by the police, Gupta added A police team even followed the duo to Malad Diamond Trading Centre in Mumbai and seized diamonds worth over Rs 2 lakh and Rs 21,700 in cash from them on Monday last, Gupta revealed.
Interrogations led to arrest of four local accomplices Babu alias Bharat Nasit, Bharat Patel, Jagdish Galani and Manoj alias Munna Dhakeya, who were all held by the crime branch here.
Further interrogations revealed that Jagdish Galani was earlier working with the diamond firm whose employees the gang looted on October 7. Galani was terminated after his involvement in an earlier diamond theft case came to light, crime branch inspector Jhala informed.
Galani along with five others planned to loot an ‘angadiya’ and accordingly, they engaged the services of an Agra-based gang. Accordingly, Amar Yadav, Kishan Jat, Tejsingh Sardar, Jaipraksah Sharanidhar, Rajeshwari and Ramadevi—all from Agra and nearby areas in Uttar Pradesh—were employed for the job, said Gupta.
The gangsters from UP had checked in at one Dimple guest house here four days before the incident, officials revealed.
All of them were taken custody by the city police team in Agra on Friday and are presently in police remand here upto Januray 20, he added.
Terming it a major success, Gupta said that attempts were on to arrest an absconder named Sanjay and recover rest of the looted diamonds.