HYDERABAD: A final-year degree student was arrested on Tuesday for cheating several city jewellery stores and mobile shops. The accused, 23-yearold Neelesh Kalantri, is pursuing BCom through distance education from the Osmania University. He is a resident of Gowliguda.
Police said Neelesh had got addicted to smoking, chewing gutkha and alcohol.
“His father, Jugal Kishore admitted him at the Anandvan Rehabilitation Centre, Pune for resolving his son’s bad habits in June 2010,’’ an official release said. Neelesh, however, ran away from the centre and came back to the city in October. He had been staying at his friend, Sahil’s house at Malakunta road.
“To meet his expenses, Neelesh decided to commit offences and targeted mobile showrooms and jewellery stores,’’ according to the release. According to police, Neelesh used to go to a jewellery store or mobile showroom as a customer and select two or three costly items. He then told the management that he wanted to show the articles to his family members before buying and asked them to send their employee along with him. After reaching a commercialcum- residential complex, Neelesh asked the shop employee to wait outside and disappeared in the interim.
He stole two gold chains from Kalanikethan shopping mall at Patny, 28 gm of gold articles from Lalchand Hastimal Jewellers at Pot Market and four mobile phones worth Rs 84,000 from Hanuman Stores at Begum Bazar. In a couple of cases, he went in a red Skoda along with the store employee. He then fled from the spot on the pretext of parking the car. Police recovered 50 gm gold ornaments, three mobile phones and a Skoda car. Neelesh was handed over to Market police for further action.
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