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Kaushambi police nab 10 with stolen bronze idols worth ₹95 crore
SP Kaushambi Hemraj Meena on Friday said SHO Mahewaghat Roshanlal and his team was on patrol near Yamuna Bridge when some suspects tried to flee on seeing the police. The ten suspects were nabbed after a chase from whom two bronze idols were recovered.
In a major breakthrough, Kaushambi police busted a gang of idol smugglers and recovered two bronze idols estimated to be worth around ₹95 crore. The police team arrested ten members of the gang on Thursday when they had come to sell the idols to some persons.
SP Kaushambi Hemraj Meena on Friday said SHO Mahewaghat Roshanlal and his team was on patrol near Yamuna Bridge when some suspects tried to flee on seeing the police. The ten suspects were nabbed after a chase from whom two bronze idols were recovered. One of the idols of ‘Thakur Ji’ weighed 62 kilograms while the other idol was in four pieces and weighed 46 kilograms. It is estimated that cost of idol weighing 62 kilograms is around ₹85 crore while that of the broken idol is ₹10 crore.
The arrested persons were identified as Usmanullah, Ramkishor Vishwakarma, Musaddar Vishwakarma, Nanka, Niraj, Ramprasad, Jitendra, Babuji Sonkar, Santosh Patel and Vipin Shukla.
They are residents of Banda, Chitrakut and Kaushambi districts.
Kingpin of the gang Ramkishor, a resident of Banda district said, he stole the two idols from a temple in Banda district 15 years back with his two accomplices who are now dead. Since then he was trying to sell the idols. However, every person whom he contacted for selling the idols, broke one of the idols for testing.
Recently, he came in contact with one Musaddar through Santosh and Jitendra. Musaddar made contact with a person in Kerala who was offering ₹25 crore for the idols. SP Kaushambi Hemraj Meena has declared a reward of ₹25,000 to police team.
