A chhattisgarh thief single-handedly planned and executed Delhi’s biggest known robbery till date worth Rs. 25 crores after he robbed a Jewellery shop of gold, cash and more. But how did he do that?
The owners of the 75-year-old Umrao Singh Jewellers in Delhi’s Jangpura locality got the shock of their lives when on reaching their store on Tuesday, they discovered a robbery of more than Rs 25 crore. Initially what seemed like an operation by a crafty gang turned out to be the work of just one person, according to the police.
Lokesh Srinivas, who has at least seven cases of robbery against his name, allegedly carried out this daring heist in the national capital.
Lokesh Srivas, who was arrested on Friday morning and is currently in the custody of the Bilaspur Police, came to Delhi alone by bus earlier this month. Police said that he carried out a recce and also found out that his target, Umrao Jewellers in the Bhogal area, stayed shut on Mondays. He broke into the store from the adjacent building around 11 pm on Sunday, September 24.
He stayed in the shop the entire night and, besides stealing the jewellery that was on display, he made his way to the strongroom. He drilled a hole into the wall and took all the ornaments from the strongroom as well. He left the shop, the same way he had come, around 7 pm on Monday – almost 20 hours after he had entered it.
The police then did a thorough investigation and it was found out that whenever the accused travelled to Delhi, he would go by road and deboard at Kashmere Gate.
Once it was established that he had fled to Durg, a team of Delhi police reached Chhattisgarh. There, an investigation was ongoing in another robbery case, where Chhattisgarh police had nabbed an accused Shiva, who told officials that he along with Lokesh Srinivas had rented a flat in Smriti Nagar area.
He would have probably evaded the cops for longer, but the other burglar told the police that he had just returned from Delhi after carrying out a “big job”.