KENDRAPARA: Unidentified miscreants looted gold and silver ornaments worth Rs 50 lakh from a jewellery showroom after drilling a hole in the store’s shutter at Thakurapatana village under Kendrapara Sadar police limits on Monday night.
The incident comes a day after robbers chopped off both the palms of a jeweller of Thakurapatana and looted gold ornaments from him in Kudanagari area of the district.
According to Dipti Ranjan Sahoo, the owner of ‘Basuvdev Aalankar’ at Thakurapatana, he closed his jewellery shop at around 9 pm and went home. At around midnight, he checked his mobile phone to watch the footage of CCTV cameras installed at his shop. To his shock, he found three miscreants entering the jewellery store.
Dipti rushed to the shop from his house at Gualisingh, about one km from his store, and tried to prevent the miscreants from fleeing with the stolen ornaments. However, the unidentified criminals threatened him with a revolver and escaped with 12 kg of silver and 220 gram of gold ornaments worth Rs 50 lakh, claimed Dipti.
IIC of Kendrapara Sadar police station Suvendu Kumar Sahoo said preliminary investigation revealed that the miscreants used a gas cutter to drill a hole in the shutter of the shop and carried out the robbery. From the spot, police seized a bike, gas cutter, gas cylinder, a helmet and a cap which the miscreants left while fleeing the place in a hurry.
“Only those who knew the geography of the area well could have carried out the robbery. Local gangs could be involved in the incident. The crime scene was examined by the forensic team and a sniffer dog was pressed into service. A case has been registered and we are checking the CCTV footage for clues. Further investigation is underway,” the IIC added.
On Sunday night, a gang of unidentified miscreants chopped off the palms of a 45-year-old jewellery shop owner of Thakurapatana with an axe and looted gold ornaments and cash from him at Hurasahi chowk under Kudanagari police limits. Pradeep Nanda, owner of Jagannath jewellery shop at Mahala haat, was returning home in his four-wheeler with gold ornaments and cash when the robbers attacked him at around 10.15 pm.