The Hindu : New Delhi News : Man arrested for flyover robberies

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Sep 07, 2007
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New Delhi

New Delhi

Man arrested for flyover robberies

Staff Reporter

A long trail of crime going back to 2002

Uttamjeet fell into bad company and started gambling
His shop was sealed by the Municipal Corporation of Delhi

NEW DELHI: A 32-year-old man allegedly involved in cases of robbery and three alleged receivers of stolen property have been arrested by the South Delhi police. The police claim to have recovered several stolen articles from them.

The Hauz Khas police received a complaint from Ashwini alleging that a man had robbed him of Rs. 48,000 in cash, a gold bracelet and a gold ring on August 31. He was going to Okhla in his car when a young man on a scooter waved at him near the Chiragh Dilli flyover. When Ashwini stopped, the man parked his scooter in front of his car and robbed him at knife-point.

The police found that three other similar cases had been reported recently on the Moolchand, Defence Colony and Mayapuri flyovers. Suspecting that all the robberies had been committed by the same person, a special team was formed to identify him.

Investigations revealed that a similar case was reported at Lodhi Colony in 2002 in which Uttamjeet Singh was arrested for targeting a woman. Subsequently the police arrested him in Karol Bagh and seized from him two scooters that were used in the crime. Some of the stolen articles were also recovered from him, the police said.

During interrogation, Uttamjeet purportedly confessed to his involvement. He told the police that on August 25 night he targeted a young man and his girlfriend. Two days later he allegedly robbed a woman of a pair of diamond tops, a diamond ring, a gold bangle and credit cards on the Defence Colony flyover. He got the PIN numbers of the cards from the woman and withdrew Rs. 2,500 through them.

On August 30, he allegedly targeted another woman on the Mayapuri flyover and made away with diamond jewellery and a credit card. He again managed to extract the credit card PIN number from the victim and allegedly withdrew Rs. 10,000 from an ATM booth.

At Uttamjeet’s instance, the police have arrested Suresh, Pradeep and Ajay Kumar to whom he allegedly disposed of the stolen articles.

The police said Uttamjeet’s father was a property dealer in Thailand and also owned a guesthouse in Karol Bagh. Uttamjeet fell into bad company and started gambling. To make up for the loss, he committed robbery for the first time in 2002 but was arrested. After his release on bail, his father sent him to Bangkok where he started running a guesthouse and married a Thai woman.

Uttamjeet returned to Delhi last year and set up a business of Chinese gift items at Mehrauli. But his shop was sealed by the Municipal Corporation of Delhi. He again got into gambling and lost a huge amount of money. He borrowed money from financiers to overcome the loss but was unable to clear the debts, following which he allegedly started committing robbery.

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