Stephan Kayyar
Daijiworld Media Network - Kasargod
Kasargod, Sep 17: Ten days after the sensational daylight bank robbery at Eriyal here, the Kasargod police led by SP Srinivas on Thursday September 17 arrested the main accused, Shariff, from Karwar in Uttara Kannada district of Karnataka.
On September 7, five masked men had entered the Kudlu Service Cooperative Bank at Eriyal and decamped with 21 kg of gold and Rs 13 lac in cash after brandishing weapons and tying up women staff and a customer.
Shariff (41), a resident of Pachambala, Bandiyod, and said to be the mastermind behind the robbery, was brought to Kasargod the same day and produced in front of the media.
Addressing a press meet here on Thursday, SP Srinivas said that the police have recovered about 10 kg of the stolen gold. However, the stolen cash is yet to be recovered.
The stolen gold was recovered from under a coconut tree near Shariff's house at Pachambala, where he had hidden it. The gold was found in 416 packets, as stored in the bank, and kept inside bags.
This is the third arrest in the case. The police had earlier nabbed Mahshook (25) from Bengaluru and Shabbir (42) from Goa.
Three others who are directly involved in the crime are absconding. The remaining gold and cash may be recovered after their arrest, the SP said.
SP Srinivas further said that Shariff, in a bid to escape from the police, had left to Mangaluru and then to Kochi, from where he took a flight to Mumbai two days ago. He then went to Karwar, from where he was apprehended on Thursday morning. The police had earlier expressed suspicions that Shariff might have fled to a foreign country. After the arrest, the police seized Shariff's passport.
The hunt for the remaining accused is on.
The investigation, headed by SP Srinivas, is being conducted by a special police team comprising inspector C K Sunilkumar, Kasargod special branch SI Rathnakar, Prakashan, Lakshmi Narayan of Vidhyanagar police, Sunil Abraham of Kasargod police station, Austin Thambi, Firoz, Gireesh, Shaju, Pratheesh Gopal, ASI John and others.