Sonu Gupta, the bullet-ridden injured mastermind of the Raniganj gold jewellery showroom heist was arrested by local police from Jharkhand and has been admitted at Burdwan Medical College Hospital.
The alleged mastermind of Siwan district in Bihar was leading the entire operation on that day and was holding a semi-automatic loaded carbine in his hand, but luckily the first bullet fired by SI Meghnad Mondal pierced through his abdomen and he fell on the ground and the loaded magazine separated from the carbine after he slipped from the stairs profusely bleeding.
He limped and was unable to stand on his feet when his other accomplices virtually pulled him in the two wheeler parked outside and fled away with the third dacoit holding him from the back. They later hijacked a four wheeler and fled to Jharkhand by road.
The gang has also looted a motorcycle at gunpoint at Salanpur and went to Raniganj riding it. Police have seized both the motorcycles and the car.
Sonu was hiding in the forests of Koiridih under Sariya police station area of Giridih district in Bihar. But SP of Giridih, Deepak Kumar Sharma and his team was already alerted and swung into action.
They chased the dacoits on the highway for about one hour blocking all the four corners, but every time the dacoits managed to escape.
The injured mastermind was hiding in the forest and trying to escape to his home state of Bihar when the Jharkhand Police nabbed him. He was admitted to a Dhanbad nursing home and later shifted to Burdwan Medical College Hospital.
A number of teams of DD, Raniganj Police are engaged in combing operation, based on the inputs provided by the arrested dacoits.
Already, Giridih Police has arrested Sonu and court has sent him to 14-day police custody.
The looted amount of the gold and diamond jewellery items was approximately Rs four crore. The Giridih Police has already recovered some looted jewellery from their bags. Two bags have also been seized.
Today, four CID officials and three forensic science experts arrived at Senco Gold Jewellery Showroom and collected samples and interrogated the eye witnesses. The dacoits have done a recce of the area before the operation and have arrived in three motorcycles. There were seven members in the team.
The entire operation lasted barely few minutes before the dacoits were forced to flee after retaliation from SI Meghnad Mondal, who was in his civvies at that time but fought bravely with his pistol which was having only six bullets against seven heavily armed dacoits with mousers and carbines.