Rs 1.44-crore train gold heist probe takes a turn: Railway police officer investigating case arrested

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Over a month after four cops robbed an employee of gold worth Rs 1.44 crore on a moving train, investigators have arrested the man who was supposed to be in charge of solving the crime.

With the arrest of Rajesh Kumar Singh, the case has gone from a heist carried out by rogue police constables to what officers now say was a carefully coordinated operation involving policemen and civilian insiders, according to a report by Hindustan Times.

Also Read: Badge to Bandit: 4 cops pull off Rs 1.44 crore gold heist on moving train

The incident took place on the Howrah-Jodhpur-Bikaner-Express between Gaya and Koderma Junction in the third week of November. It came to light on December 29 by the police after investigation of the case on the complaint of the businessman.

The businessman, Manoj Soni, from Bengal's Howrah, lodged a complaint after suspecting foul play from his employee Dhananjay Shaswat, who was to supply the gold in Jaipur.

Soni said that he approached the Bihar Railway police and got a case registered against unidentified persons in uniform when the employee kept on saying that he was robbed by the cops.

“Four constables, who were deputed at Gaya Junction but were not part of any escort party, were found involved in the robbing. The probe confirmed their nexus with criminals and through whom they got to know of gold transportation. They boarded the train they should not have and carried out the operation at Koderma in Jharkhand on the pretext of carrying out search in train,” said an official who was part of the probe, according to HT.

According to the complaint, four men in uniform entered the compartment, searched Shaswat’s belongings and recovered gold from him and took him with them till the gate of the compartment.

"The uniformed robbers stopped the train by pulling chain somewhere in the middle between Gaya and Koderma and took him to some blind spot and robbed all his belongings and again they took him to Gaya junction by giving him a return ticket from Gaya to Howrah advising him not to say anything to anyone. Even two of them accompanied him till Dhanbad and then they left,” read the complaint lodged with police.

For days, the focus of the probe remained on the four constables, who were unidentified initially. They were suspended and soon went missing. Two civilians — Parvez Alam and former GRP driver Sitaram — were also identified as part of the plot.

However, their were still loopholes. The gold trader refused to accept Shashwat’s account at face value. He filed a complaint, alleging that his staffer himself may have been complicit. As Shashwat repeated his statement to police, Soni escalated the matter to senior railway police officers. Still, there was little visible movement. The constables were named on December 30.

Soni got another complaint lodged with the railway SP on November 27 in Patna, who forwarded it to Gaya rail police for further action on November 28. Seven days after the robbery, Soni approached Rajesh Verma, the MP from Khagaria. Shortly after, a special investigation team was formed, according to HT.

“The arrests came after technical evidence, call detail records, tower location and other investigations revealed their involvement. The SIT constituted on the instructions of the Railway SP started a layer-by-layer investigation into the entire case,” an official familiar with the matter, told HT requesting anonymity.

Then, on Wednesday, Rajesh Singh was summoned to Patna and questioned for nearly eight hours. By evening, he was under arrest. He was later produced before a railway judicial magistrate and remanded to judicial custody in Gaya.

According to the investigators, Singh and the four suspended constables –now identified asKaran Kumar, Abhishek Chaturvedi, Ranjay Kumar and Anand Mohan -- allegedly approached Soni on December 12 with an offer: The gold biscuits would be returned. But Soni did not accept the proposal.

Police now believe Alam had provided the input about Shashwat carrying gold to the accused. “We don’t know how Alam got the information as he is yet to be arrested,” the officer said.

The list of suspects continues to grow. “More heads are set to roll in the case, as the Gaya Rail DSP’s laxity has also come into light. The DSP did not even visit the spot or supervise the case even a month after the complaint was received," said the second police officer on condition of anonymity, HT reported.

Rail superintendent of police Enamul Haq Mangnoo said that the investigation so far has found complicity of seven persons. Further investigation is underway.