E-Paper
Mohali: Three held for robbing Afghan national at knifepoint
The accused have been identified as Surinder Singh of Green Valley, Mundi Kharar, Sandeep Kumar of Golden City Kharar and Amar of Chandigarh
A week after an Afghanistan national lost his belongings, including his refugee card, to miscreants in an auto-rickshaw that he boarded from Kharar, police arrested three persons and recovered five stolen mobile phones, ₹16,000, a knife and impounded the auto-rickshaw allegedly used in the crime.
The accused have been identified as Surinder Singh of Green Valley, Mundi Kharar, Sandeep Kumar of Golden City Kharar and Amar of Chandigarh.
Police said the accused auto-rickshaw driver Surinder and his accomplice Sandeep Kumar snatched the belongings of the victim, Qais Ahmad, at knifepoint and sold his mobile phone.
Following the incident, the victim went from pillar to post to get his complaint registered with the Mohali police before reaching out to senior police officials. A case was finally registered at the Kharar City police station on February 16, 2023.
In his complaint, the victim who is currently residing in Swaraj Nagar stated, “In order to get my passport renewed from New Delhi, I boarded an auto-rickshaw from Kharar bus stand to reach Chandigarh bus stand early morning around 4 am on February 13. There was another passenger in the auto-rickshaw, which took a different route. I confronted the driver about the same, but he told me that he was supposed to drop the other passenger first. After dropping the passenger, we circled back to the Airport Road.”
“On the way, he picked his friend and took the vehicle to an isolated area near Sector 81 where they snatched ₹16,000 along with a mobile phone and my wallet carrying my UN card and other important documents at knifepoint. They threatened to kill me, but after a few people turned up at the spot, they fled,” he added.
The complainant visited a number of police stations after the incident, but no case was registered initially.
Despite repeated attempts, Kharar deputy superintendent of police (DSP) Rupinder Deep Kaur remained unavailable for comments on the same.
Police officials, meanwhile, said the accused were allegedly involved in five other snatchings in Mohali.
DSP Kaur, while addressing a press conference, said “Our team managed to trace them using human and technical intelligence. Both the key accused after robbing the victims used to sell the mobiles to Amar, and thus he was nominated in the case and was eventually arrested too. We will find out more about their accomplices during their interrogation.”
