26 held for duping women; jewellery worth Rs 65 lakh recovered

Bangalore: City police have uncovered a racket by a gang in duping gullible women under the guise of police personnel and relieving them of gold ornaments with the arrest of 26 persons in Bidar recently and recovered jewellery valued at Rs 65 lakh from them.

The gang members posing themselves as policemen, officials from CCB or CID used to target lone women walking on streets and tell them to remove their jewels and keep them in their bags claiming some robbers were on the prowl in that area, Police Commissioner Jyotipraksh Mirji told reporters here.

Under the pretext of helping them to pack the jewels, they would ingenieously take away the ornaments.

As such cheating incidents rose, the police formed a 200-member strong team to track down the culprits and the team traced the gang to Irani Galli, a colony in Bidar city.

Mirji said when the police team visited the colony on February 4 to nab the gang members, but some of the culprits hurled stones at the raiding party.

He said though 35 persons had been picked up, nine were released after they were found to be innocent and 26 others were arrested.