Davangere (Karnataka), March 31 (IANS) Police in Karnataka’s Davangere, investigating the October 2024 bank heist, were initially without any leads and pursued multiple directions of inquiry, which unexpectedly helped solve several other major cases – including the capture of the notorious Kakrala gang from Uttar Pradesh.
“Cracking this case has resulted in multiple victories for the police in Davanagere and Karnataka. Along with recovering most of the stolen property and apprehending the offenders in the Nyamati SBI theft, the Davanagere police teams were also able to arrest active and notorious members of the Kakrala gang,” Davanagere SP Uma Prashath said on Monday.
This has led to detection of various other property offences involving banks in South India. Arresting these offenders will also lead to the prevention of further offences by the same gang, she stated.
For the police who started an investigation into the Nyamati SBI bank gold robbery, one of the notable ideas was to collect clues from places of failed bank theft attempts in Karnataka in the recent past, for eg. the SBI bank theft attempt in Holehonnur, Bhadravati (30 kms from Nyamati) on August 2, 2024.
Technical evidences found in this pursuit led to the probable conclusion that this theft was done by members of the Kakrala gang who hail from Kakrala in Uttar Pradesh’s Badaun district.
There are about 5-6 gangs of bank offenders in Kakrala and neighbouring towns who have been notoriously committing bank thefts and robberies across the country, and especially in south India for the past decade, including the gold theft from the SBI branch at Rayaparathy in Telangana’s Warangal in November 2024.
The modus operandi of the Kakrala gang also had striking similarities with the Nyamati bank theft, the only difference being the usage of chilli powder.
The Kakrala gangs usually targeted banks surrounded by large fields. Further, the entry through the window, usage of gas cutters, decamping with the DVR and completely avoiding usage of mobile phones were all part of their modus operandi.
From November 2024 to February 2024, the investigation teams conducted several operations in difficult terrains across Gujarat, Rajasthan, Delhi, and Uttar Pradesh to apprehend these gang members.
Based on inputs from these operations, the team was successful in apprehending 5 notorious members of the Kakrala gang earlier this month. These were identified as Guddu Kalia, Aslam aka Tantun, Hazarath Ali, Kamruddin aka Sareilly Babu, and Babu Sahan.
The above persons were absconding accused in several cases in Karnataka, ranging from 2014 to 2024, with the notable ones being the 15 kg gold robbery from the Karnataka Grameena Bank’s Hosahalli Branch in November 2022 and the 4 kg gold robbery from Karnataka Grameena Bank’s Bevuru Branch.
Further, this was the first time these offenders had been arrested by the Karnataka Police. Most importantly, enquiries with these offenders led to the fresh detection of various property offences that had happened in recent times in Karnataka and Tamil Nadu.
However, the police were not able to directly link these offenders to the Nyamati bank offence and continued their investigation in this regard.
Though the police ran a fine comb through voluminous data, it was a challenge to pinpoint the offenders.
Despite the challenge as the robbers of the Nyamati branch were able to execute this heist without leaving any evidence such as fingerprints, CCTV footage, toll data, and cell/phone data, police managed to zero in on and arrest the perpetrators, identified as Vijay Kumar, 30, Ajay Kumar, 28, Abheesheka, 23, Chandru, 23, Manjunath, 32 and Paramananda, 30. Vijay Kumar and Ajay Kumar are brothers, while Paramanda is the husband of their sister. All are first-time criminals.
The main accused, Vijay Kumar, had hidden most of the stolen gold in a locker and lowered it into a remote well in Tamil Nadu’s Madurai with the intention of retrieving it after two years to avoid being caught. He was the only person who knew where it was hidden.
However, he and his associates had already started encashing some of the gold to build houses and expand their business. Police also recovered gold that had been pledged in different financial institutions in the name of Vijaykumar’s relatives and gold sold at various jewellery shops during the past 5 months. In total, the police have been successful in recovering 17 kg of the stolen gold.
IGP, Davanagere East Zone, B.R. Ravikanthe Gowda said on Monday that the gang had decided to use the gold after two years, when everyone forgot about the case. With three of the accused relatives and the other three being the main accused’s friends, no one had given the secret out and had returned to their normal lives after committing the crime. They were together in the intention to share the loot after liquidation two years later, the IGP said.
Police sources further stated that after the gold heist, the accused had kept the stolen bullion in a car and parked it in Nyamati town for three days. After this, when the search of vehicles was withdrawn, the accused had taken the car to their village near Madurai in Tamil Nadu.
–IANS
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