Surat robbery-cum-murder: Two arrested for renting out rooms to accused without documents

The accused carried out the robbery, having held showroom owner Vishal Rajpara, his friend Rajesh Soni, and two salesgirls at gunpoint. Vishal’s brother Ashish Rajpara, who runs Shrinath Jewellers, another jewellery shop in the same complex, saw the accused committing the crime, through the CCTV camera. He shouted for help and rushed to Vishal’s shop. When Ashish tried to catch the robbers, who were fleeing with the robbed booty, they fired two rounds from their pistols at him. Ashish sustained severe injury during the incident.

Rajesh was also shot in the leg after he came out of the shop and tried to catch the robbers. Azim Shaikh, a vegetable vendor, also tried in vain and got shot in the thigh.

Furious, people present in the area chased the four robbers for a few metres and successfully caught one of them and thrashed him before handing him over to the police. The robbber was later sent to New Civil Hospital for treatment.

Ashish was rushed to a private hospital, but was declared dead. Rajesh and Azim are currently stable.

Vishal lodged a complaint at Sachin police station late on Monday, and offences of murder, robbery, attempt to murder were registered against all four accused.

The Sachin police launched an investigation and discovered that the gang had arrived in Surat from Bihar a few days prior to the robbery and had stayed in two different rooms in Sachin.

Acting on the information, Sachin police officers met the owners of the room and sought details from them about the accused. The owners revealed that they had not collected Aadhaar cards or other documents from their tenants.

Sachin police lodged an offence under Section 223 of the BNS (disobedience to orders duly promulgated by a public servant) and for violation of a notification by the police commissioner, against these room owners, after which they were arrested. The owners have been identified as Bharat Kalal (34) and Anil Thakur (44) — both residents of SUDA Awas in Sachin.

Apart from this, the police on Wednesday also took custody of Dipak Paswan, one of the robbers who was admitted to New Civil Hospital, after his discharge.

Surat Assistant Commissioner of Police (I Division) N P Gohil said, “We have got custody of one of the robbers, Deepak Paswan, and we will arrest him soon. We have recovered two bikes used by the robbers to travel to the crime scene. We have also recovered two live cartridges and four empty cartridges of a pistol from the spot. The three other accused have been identified and we have launched a hunt for them. We will fetch more information from Dipak Paswan, who has been involved in over six criminal cases, including theft and robbery, from 2019 to 2023. We are trying to obtain details from Bihar police about the criminal cases registered against the other robbers.”