Gurugram, Oct 17 Police have arrested three men in connection with the theft of cloves worth around Rs 2 crore and recovered 20.9 tonnes of stolen material and two trucks used in the crime, officials said on Saturday.
According to the police, preliminary interrogation revealed that a cloves-loaded truck en route from Mumbai to Delhi’s Khari Baoli was stolen in Gurugram. The accused transferred the goods to other trucks at an isolated location and planned to transport the stolen consignment to Assam for sale, they added.
On October 14, an official of ABC Express Company filed a complaint that a consignment of 500 bags of cloves, valued at approximately Rs 2 crore, was being transported from Nhava Sheva, Maharashtra, to Delhi and it did not reach its designated destination.
On October 11, the truck driver was informed of the delivery address. After the consignment failed to reach its destination, the company attempted to contact the driver, but both his mobile phones were found switched off, he added.
Subsequently, a search was conducted for the truck, which was found abandoned and empty near the Royal Paper Hotel, close to Bawal. An examination of the truck’s GPS location revealed it had been in Gurugram’s Sector-93 area on the night of October 12.
During an inspection of the spot, police found scattered cloves and marking labels from the bags, indicating the goods had been unloaded at the location and transferred to other trucks, they said.
Based on the complaint, a case was registered at Sector 10 Police Station, they said.
During the investigation, the police arrested three accused on Friday near Pasco Fitting Centre in Rathwas and identified them as Aziz, a resident of Assam, and Manan and Junaid, both residents of Haryana, they said.
“During police interrogation, it emerged that the accused unloaded the truck carrying the cloves at an isolated location in the Sector-88/89 area of Gurugram and transferred the goods into two other trucks to execute the theft,” a senior police officer said.
The truck used in the crime belongs to Manan, while Junaid worked as its driver. The accused allegedly planned to transport the stolen goods to Assam and sell them there. Aziz was allegedly involved in facilitating the sale of the stolen goods, the officer said.
(PTI News)
