Vijayawada: Cops crack Rs 5 cr gold theft, arrest employee

Vijayawada: In a major breakthrough, the city crime police on Saturday nabbed one gold worker and recovered 10 kg gold articles, which he had stolen from the shop owner in Jaihind complex in the city on April 27.

According to commissioner of police B Srinivasulu, the accused gold worker Bobbili Venkata Harsha of Krishnalanka was working at Rahul Jewellers in Jaihind gold market for the past one year. His owner Mahaveer trusted him and asked him to bring the gold from the residence in the fifth floor of the building to the shop located in the ground floor.

The worker Harsha used to take the gold from shop to home and home to shop regularly. Taking advantage of the trust reposed by the shop owner, Harsha decided to rob the gold.

On April 27, he went to the residence of Mahaveer and told his wife that her husband had asked him to bring the gold. The wife trusted him and gave 10 kg gold articles worth nearly Rs 5 crore. The accused kept the gold articles in two bags and left the complex. The trader lodged a complaint to the police.

The accused on April 18 vacated his home in Krishnalanka and took a rented house in Tadigadapa and hatched a plan to rob the gold and settle in Tadigadapa with the stolen gold articles. He is the native of Srikakulam district and came to Vijayawada few years back.

The police during the course of investigation noticed that accused Harsha was in Tadigadapa and apprehended him. In the meantime, he got hold of a blank cheque of the gold trader and withdrew Rs 4.60 lakh with the forged signature.

The police identified withdrawal of cash from the bank account of the gold trader and recovered the entire Rs 4.60 lakh. As per the instruction of the commissioner of police Srinivasulu and the supervision of the DCP Vikranth Patil and additional commissioner police M Subhash Chandra Bose, the crime police team successfully unravelled the mystery of gold theft and nabbed the accused.