Wig trader, aide steal hair worth Rs 25 lakh from rival company

The man had conducted a recce of his rival company in outer Delhi’s Nangloi, and robbed them of over 200kg of hair at gunpoint, last month.

In a ‘hair-raising’ incident, a wig trader robbed his rival of hair worth ₹25 lakh at gunpoint. Police said 42-year-old Ajay Kumar, whose hair exporting business was not doing well, hatched the conspiracy.

A total of 118kg of hair was recovered, the police said. (HT Photo)

Kumar conducted a recce of his rival company Jhangir Enterprises in outer Delhi’s Nangloi, and robbed them of over 200kg of hair at gunpoint, last month. Kumar and his aide were arrested by the Delhi Police on Sunday and 118kg of hair was recovered, police said.

Police said Kumar’s aide Mangal Sen (42) posed as a customer to conduct a recce of the hair treating factory owned by Jahangir Hussain on July 25.

Just two days later, Sen, Kumar and a third associate barged into Hussain’s factory with a gun and knives. They assaulted Hussain and his younger brother Tajjudin Hussain before tying them up. The trio then fled with more than 200kg hair, ₹30,000 cash and a few mobile phones.

The Delhi Police managed to trace Sen to Uttar Pradesh’s Rampur on Sunday and recovered the stolen cellphones.

Deputy commissioner of police (Outer) Seju P Kuruvilla said Sen was traced using the phone number that he had used to contact Jahangir Enterprise in the garb of placing an order to export hair. “We mounted surveillance on the number. Since Hussain had told us that one of their rivals, Kumar, had introduced Sen to him, we were also keeping a watch on Kumar. The conspiracy unravelled once we caught Sen in UP,” he said.

“Sen disclosed that the stolen hair was kept with Kumar, who lives in Sultanpuri. A police team searched his residence and arrested him. At Kumar’s instance, the police recovered 118kg hair from his godowns in Laxmi Nagar, Ganesh Nagar and Pandav Nagar in Delhi. We have also recovered the countrymade pistol used in the robbery,” the DCP said.

Hussain said they purchased the hair from Tirupati and other temples in Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. “Hair is auctioned there. We buy it at a cost of around ₹22,000 to ₹23,000 a kilo. The hair is then treated and then sold for ₹26,000 to ₹28,000,” he said, adding that longer the hair, higher the price.

He said most of the hair is sold online to foreign firms. “We sell the hair abroad. The entire business is online. If we get an order, we also make wigs. Price also varies... We have also sold hair for ₹80,000 a kilo,” he said.