Multicrore gold heist: IIFL staff among seven held

CUTTACK: The Commissionerate Police has made a big breakthrough in the sensational daylight robbery at the India Infoland Ltd (IIFL) by detaining seven persons allegedly involved in the heist. 

Two kg gold and bikes used in the crime were recovered from the possession of the accused. Of the seven, Lala Amrit Ray who is an employee of the private finance company, is stated to be the mastermind of the loot that took place on November 19.

The other accused include Lala’s brother Lala Ranjan Ray, friend Ranjan Behera, Rajkishore Sahu, Pradipta Behera, Prakash Sahu and Santosh Bhoi.

Commissioner of Police Sudhanshu Sarangi told mediapersons that Amrit was working with the finance company for last 5 years and had earlier misappropriated some gold ornaments mortgaged with IIFL.

He was allegedly hand-in-glove with the then set of company auditors and had managed to conceal the crime. 

However, he found it difficult to connive with the new auditors engaged by IIFL recently. Apprehending that his crime could be caught during fresh auditing, he met friend Ranjan and the two chalked out a plan to loot the company to cover up Amrit’s embezzlement of gold ornaments. They then roped in Rajkishore, Pradipta, Prakash and Santosh for the loot.

A day before the incident, the accused conducted a recce and prepared an escape route map. What made things easier for them was lack of adequate security measures at the company. While the armed security guard of IIFL was on leave for a fortnight, the alarm system was not operating for the last three months. CCTVs and the digital locker of the loan and investment centre of IIFL were also defunct making the loot of cash and gold from the locker easy, the Police Commissioner said. 

After the loot, Rajkishore, Pradipta, Prakash and Santosh returned to Kissan Nagar via Salepur in two motorcycles. They then mortgaged a substantial quantity of the gold ornaments with another finance company where Amrit’s brother Ranjan is employed and hid the rest. Interestingly, Ranjan was earlier arrested for misappropriating gold ornaments from the company where he works and had got bail. 

During investigation, police verified the footage of CCTVs installed near the company branch office and detected one of the motorcycles used in the crime. Tracing the motorcycle number, they zeroed down on the accused persons and seized two kg of gold ornaments, the bikes and helmets used in the crime. Sarangi said the seven accused persons are under interrogation.

The accused had looted gold ornaments worth Rs 10 crore and Rs 4.30 lakh cash at gun-point from the Nayasark branch office. In its police complaint, the company had claimed that gold ornaments worth `20 crore was looted in the heist.

SECURITY LAPSES

• Armed security guard of IIFL was on leave for a fortnight

• Alarm system at IIFL was not operating for the last three months

• CCTVs and the digital locker of the loan and investment centre of IIFL were also defunct making the loot of cash and gold from the locker easy

• Accused had looted gold ornaments worth Rs 10 cr and Rs 4.30 lakh cash at gun-point from the Nayasark branch office. In its police complaint, the company claimed that gold ornaments worth Rs 20 cr was looted