Thieves run into UP cops after robbing 67-year-old

The police recovered two bullets, an empty cartridge, two cellphones, a scooter and ₹54,000 cash from the two men, identified as Nazim and Aabid.

New Delhi: Two robbers who held a 67-year-old man hostage in his Kalkaji Extension flat, assaulted him, and stole cash and jewellery worth over ₹5 lakh on Tuesday afternoon were in for a rude surprise as they fled — a police team from Uttar Pradesh was waiting metres away from the building to arrest the men, having tracked them down for their role in robberies in Ghaziabad around a month ago.

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One of the suspects then fired two rounds at the five-member police team, which retaliated, firing a couple of shots of their own. The robbers managed to escape, slipping into the narrow bylanes of the south Delhi neighbourhood, which they were familiar with. The UP Police team finally arrested the two near Indirapuram in Ghaziabad, early on Thursday, officers said.

The police recovered two bullets, an empty cartridge, two cellphones, a scooter and ₹54,000 cash from the two men, identified as Nazim and Aabid, who have reportedly been involved in “hundreds” of crimes since 2005.

“Interrogations led to the arrest of one Raju Sonu, a 48-year-old jeweller from Faridabad who received the jewellery they stole,” said Abhay Kumar Mishra, circle officer (CO) of Indirapuram.

All the jewellery stolen from Kalkaji Extension was recovered later on, the police said.

The Uttar Pradesh police were looking for the two robbers in connection with two burglaries they committed in two flats in the neighbourhood’s Abhay Khand-3 around a month ago, Mishra said. A team from the police station identified the suspects, got details of two cellphones they were using and began tracking them.

On Tuesday, the police team was on its way to another assignment when they learnt that the two suspects were spotted in Kalkaji Extension, where they tried to ambush the robbers.

The robbers broke into the second floor flat around 1.30pm on Tuesday, when its owner, 67-year-old Ashok Kumar, who retired as an assistant officer from the New India Assurance Company Ltd, was having lunch on the third floor of the same building.

His son, Nitesh Punhani, was at work in Noida and his daughter-in-law was in Bengaluru.

He returned to the second floor after lunch and found that the lock of the door was broken and the main door was ajar, the police said. As he stepped in, the two men caught hold of him and punched in his jaw and hit him on his back. They threatened him and told him to hand over all the cash and valuables in the flat.

“My father gave them ₹40,000 kept in his almirah. The robbers then locked him inside the bathroom and threatened to kill him if he raised an alarm. They then ransacked the house and decamped with cash and jewellery worth around ₹5 lakh,” said Punhani.

Footage from CCTV cameras installed nearby showed that the robbers entered the building around 1.30pm and left 15 minutes later, but ran into police officers outside the building.

“We don’t know what happened outside our building. The local police told us that the people were from the UP Police,” he added.

Mishra said the robbers attacked the police team first.

“They fired two bullets at our team and fled, taking advantage of the narrow lanes. However, our team caught them around 12.10am on Thursday. The cash and jewellery stolen from the Kalkaji Extension flat have been recovered. More cash properties related to other cases have also been recovered,” said Mishra.

Delhi deputy commissioner of police (southeast) Esha Pandey said: “We registered two separate cases – one for the armed robbery on Kumar’s complaint and another regarding the encounter on the complaint of the UP Police personnel. The suspects have been arrested by our UP counterparts. We will be seeking custody of the arrested suspects through production remand.”