Ahmedabad: Rs 1.8 crore gold heist amid 4,000-cop strong New Year bandobust

AHMEDABAD: The New Year for the city began with one of the biggest robberies in recent times — 27 packages of gold jewellery worth Rs 1.78 crore disappeared in a violent heist amid a 4,000-cops bandobust. But senior police officials said late on Friday that they rounded up five persons and recovered a major part of the consignment within hours of the robbery.
Three men had robbed two couriers of the gold packages on Friday at 3.25am near the Air Force’s headquarters in Meghaninagar. Police had put in place heavy deployment across the city to nab New Year celebrants breaking curfew and prohibition laws. But the robbers managed to slip through the nakabandi networks.
Police sources said that the victims, Vidhyadhar Sharma, 35, of Sardarnagar and Jagdish Chaudhary were injured when they tried to confront the robbers. Sharma is the complainant.
“Sharma was hit with a stick on his hand while Jagdish was struck on his head,” said an official of Meghaninagar police. “Both were taken to Civil Hospital.”
According to the FIR lodged by Sharma, he owns two courier companies, Jay Mataji Logistics and Jay Mataji Air in partnership with one Suresh Chaudhary. Offices of both the courier companies are located in Rajkot but they collect parcels from Ahmedabad.
Inspector J L Chauhan of Meghaninagar police said that the companies send packages containing gold to different parts of the country by air.
According to the complaint, on December 30, 2020, Sharma’s partner Suresh Chaudhary called Sharma to say he is sending some gold parcels from Rajkot with Shyamsunder Sharma, a cousin of the complainant, and Jagdish.
“On the night of December 31, Shyamsunder called Sharma and told him that he and Jagdish were waiting for him near the Sardar Patel statue close to the airport. Sharma brought Shyamsunder and Jagdish to his house on his bike,” the Meghaninagar police official said. “Later, Sharma and Jagdish set off for the air cargo complex with the consignment.”
Police officials said that as Sharma turned towards the air cargo complex road, three men intercepted and attacked him and Jagdish.