‘Friend’ robs woman of cash, jewellery

The Charkop police of north Mumbai area arrested a gang of five men for robbing a woman from Malad of over Rs 6 lakh. Four of the accused are repeat offenders.

The arrested accused had on April 1 entered the house of a woman in Malvani area of Malad and tied her and her friend and looted Rs 6.87 lakh from the house. The case was registered on April 1 and after interrogating another friend of the victim, the officials nabbed the accused. They accused will be produced in court on Tuesday, said the police.

They have recovered Rs 5.98 lakh from them. The accused have been identified as Vinod aka Vicky Sharanappa Rapathy (34), Amardeep Narayan Chavhan alias Kachchi (24), Vinayak Shrirang Vadam aka Raja (32), Vishal Ramesh Pise (36) and Nitin Dayaram Bhor (32). These accused have been booked under various relevant sections of the IPC. Except Vicky, all other accused are repeat offenders, said a police source.

On the day of the incident, a Nagpur-based businessman Anand Tukaram Bondare (34) had come to visit his friend Pinky Chodhary at the Triveni Mhada tower in Malvani. Ms Chodhary had gone to receive her friend but when they returned to her place, they found the door ajar and a few people were found waiting inside.

They tied up Ms Chodhary and Mr Bondare and snatched all their money and jewellery.

Following the incident Bonader lodged a police complaint. A senior official from Charkop told The Asian Age, that Vinod Aka Vicky was a friend of Pinky and he often used to visit her in Malvani. During his visits he came to know that Pinkey is friends with a rich man from Nagpur who often visits her at her house. Later, Vicky conspired with the other accused and managed to get the keys of her house and made a duplicate set. As per their plan, when Vicky came to know the rich friend would be arriving soon, he hatched a plan to loot them.