Mumbai Crime: Trio who robbed highway restaurant nabbed in 4 hours

The restaurant the accused robbed, and the car they arrived in. Pic /Hanif Patel

The local Crime Branch and the Kasa, Talasari and Gholwad police have arrested a trio that had robbed a restaurant on the Mumbai-Ahmedabad National Highway in the wee hours of Thursday, within just four hours of the crime. The trio robbed R1.10 lakh from the owner of Hotel Aakash, and when he raised an alarm and staff and customers rushed to help, one of them fired in the air, helping them escape.

The Crime Branch, Kasa, Talasari and Gholwad police launched a combing operation in the surrounding areas and caught the accused from Boisar within four hours of the incident. According to the police, the three arrested accused are residents of Bulandshahr in UP. They came to Mumbai a few days ago and were staying in Boisar. A pistol was recovered from them. The police said judging by their activities and mode of the crime, it seems that they are professionals.

The accused were identified as Subodh Yadav, 20, Mukul Devendra Chaudhari, 20, and Ravi Kumar Solanki, 20. During the interrogation it was revealed they had recceed the restaurant at 8:00 pm. They committed the crime around 2.20 am. They had dinner at the hotel, after which one of them went to the counter on the pretext of paying the bill and the other two sat in their car. The police said the accused threatened the owner and snatched the money from him. The owner raised an alarm and staff and truck drivers who had arrived to dine rushed to help. Some of them rushed to the car and snatched its keys to prevent the accused from leaving. "When the first accused started firing in the air to save his accomplices, they managed to escape," said Palghar District Superintendent of Police Dattatray Shinde. "We traced the car owner from Palghar. He revealed that he had rented his car to the accused," he added.

The accused were arrested under sections 394 (voluntarily causing hurt in committing robbery), 397 (robbery) and 34 (common intention) of IPC and sections 3, 25 of Arms Act.

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