Four held for robbing trader of Rs 45 lakh in Bengaluru

BENGALURU: One-and-a half months after a cigarette distributor was robbed of Rs 45.5 lakh, his employee and three teenagers have landed in custody.
Officials on Saturday recovered Rs 31,86,500, including Rs 9 lakh hidden in a car tyre, from the gang. Mohammed Ishak, 25, salesman of distributor Rakesh Pokarna, 45, is the main accused. His associates Mohammed Parvez, 19, Mohammed Adnan, 19, and Afnan Pasha, 19, are college dropouts. They splurged over Rs 13 lakh on buying iPhones and clothes.
The robbery occurred on June 11 when Pokarana was returning home in his car. He is a distributor for a major cigarette brand in Bengaluru and over 100 salesmen work with him.
He had collected cash from his salesmen, kept it in his car’s glove compartment and was returning home via Lingarajapuram. At 6.25pm, a biker rammed the car. His driver Chandru didn’t stop the car, but the biker kept following them, blaring the horn. Finally, Chandru stopped the car near Clarence Public School and got down. The driver and the biker were arguing when the pillion rider got down and took away the cash box. Two more knife-wielding miscreants joined in when Pokarana, who was in the backseat, tried to snatch the box back. “They sped away in two bikes which had no number plates,” police said.
The accused shared the loot equally. Ishak spent Rs 2 lakh from his share and hid Rs 9 lakh in a car tyre and kept it in his sister’s house at Bethamangala in Kolar district. The other three accused hid their shares in the houses of their friends in Bengaluru, after spending a part of it. “We had CCTV footages and suspected Ishak’s involvement. We recovered three mobile phones and three two-wheelers from the accused. They appear to be first-time offenders,” an officer said.