A 42-year-old property dealer and two others have been arrested on Thursday for conspiring to steal ₹20 lakh by staging a robbery in Modinagar, Ghaziabad, late Tuesday, officials said.
Police identified the three as Praveen Kumar Gupta, the property dealer; his employee Ayush Singh (22); and his friend Mohammad Zehab (26) who runs an online sports items business. All three are residents of Meerut.
According to police, Gupta had been facing financial distress and had not paid Ayush for three months, while Zehab’s business was struggling.
In that light, the three decided to steal the money from a property sale deal that Gupta had closed in Meerut.
They “attempted to stage a robbery by making fake calls to the police from multiple locations,” deputy commissioner of police (DCP) Surendra Nath Tiwari told HT.
According to the DCP, the property belonged to a seller from Delhi’s Safdarjung Enclave and a buyer from Meerut had entrusted ₹20 lakh to Gupta to deliver to the seller.
On the night of March 17, the trio started off from Meerut towards Modinagar. They turned toward Bakharva village on the Hapur Road. There, Zehab called Ghaziabad police and told them that two unidentified bikers had robbed them midway after stopping their car.
“We received the information around 9:15pm on March 17, and the caller told police about the robbery of ₹30 lakhs,” the DCP said. However, during questioning, police found discrepancies in their statements.
“When questioned further, Gupta revealed their plan. Police recovered ₹19 lakh from him, and he had already spent ₹1 lakh,” the DCP added.
Police have registered a first information report (FIR) under Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) section 309(4) for robbery at Modinagar police station. However, officials added that the three suspects will also be booked under the BNS section for cheating and will also face a case for providing false information to the police.