The accused had rented the drilling machine from a company in October, defaulted on the rent and switched off his phone, the address he gave in the agreement was also an old one
A cop disguised as engineers at the Govandi site
Mumbai Crime Branch cops disguised as engineers have arrested a man who disappeared with a rented drilling machine worth Rs 76 lakh. The accused had switched off his phone sometime after taking the equipment on rent.
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The operation was conducted by Unit II of the Crime Branch. Accused Ishak Mulla, 38, had leased the Horizontal Directional Drilling (HDD) machine from Vikram Tele Infra Pvt Ltd on October 11. The machine had to be returned after the completion of the work.
Ishak Mulla and (right) the drilling machine that Mulla had stolen
However, Mulla defaulted on his rent and switched off his phone. The company also realised that Mulla had moved from the address mentioned in the agreement two years ago. The company then filed a theft case at Malabar Hill police station.
Conducting its parallel investigation, the Crime Branch procured the CDRs of the mobile number given by Mulla and shortlisted numbers of people he was in contact with before he switched off the phone. The officers, posing as engineers, contacted one of the numbers and told the person to send their boss to a site in Govandi on December 2 to arrange the deal.
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Officers Hriday Mishra, Sunil Harad and Prashant Thithme from the team formed by senior police inspector Sanjay Nikumbhe for this probe, then reached the Govandi site at the scheduled time. They donned yellow helmets and civil clothes to appear as engineers. Mulla too arrived on a two-wheeler to discuss the deal. However, before he could realise that the people he is talking to are not engineers, he was taken in custody.
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