Three held for stealing antique Kashmiri shawls worth ₹ 2cr
SUPER THIEF? Vinay Parmar, an antique dealer, scouted museum for months, introduced himself as a researcher
NEW DELHI: Delhi Police have arrested three men, including an antique dealer, for allegedly stealing 16 vintage Kashmiri Pashmina shawls worth Rs 2 crore from the National Handicrafts and Handlooms Museum in central Delhi.
The theft allegedly took place last month.
The shawls, estimated to more than 250 years old, were allegedly stolen from t he National Handicrafts and Handlooms Museum, popularly known as the Crafts Museum, on the night of October 29.
The arrested men have been identified as Vinay Parmar, Tarun Harvodiya and Mohd Adil Sheikh. All 16 shawls that were stolen have been recovered .
Police on Friday said Parmar, the alleged mastermind of the crime and his cousin Harvodiya were arrested from Kolkata on November 13, leading to the seizure of 15 shawls.
The sixteenth shawl was found in the possession of Sheikh at his Abul Fazal Enclave house on Thursday.
Police suspect that Sheikh, a globetrotter who is in the export business, had allegedly kept the shawl as a sample to show his prospective clients.
DCP (New Delhi) BK Singh said Parmar wanted to lead an extravagant lifestyle. He inspected the shawls on the exhibition board for months posing as a researcher.
“Parmar made several trips to the museum, claiming to be a scholar. He even convinced the staff there that he was going to become the in-charge of the museum soon,” said Singh.
DUMMY RUN
To come up with a foolproof strategy, he took a few more precautions like choosing a Sunday night to strike because the museum was closed on Mondays and even carrying out a Vinay Parmar hides self inside museum after it closes. He realises that the CCTVS were not working Harvodiya then breaks open a window and throws the shawls outside to Parmar dummy run, where Parmar hid inside the museum.
“He hid in the museum to check whether the CCTV cameras inside were working or not on October 22. As the other guests left around 5.30pm, he stayed back and spent nearly an hour and a half before raising an alarm,” said Singh.
“When the gates were opened A week later, Parmar’s cousin Tarun Harvodiya hides himself in basement of museum. , he claimed that he had been signalling to the CCTV cameras focusing on the shawls but no one came. That was when he learnt that the cameras were not working,” Singh added.
THE THEFT
On November 29, Parmar and Harvodiya once again went to the museum. This time Harvod- Parmar talks to Harvodiya from outside the museum Cops arrest Parmar and Harvodiya from Kolkata. Mohd Adil Sheikh is nabbed from Abul Fazal Enclave iya stayed back just the way Parmar had on the previous occasion, but hid in the basement instead. Parmar himself went out with the other visitors when the staff locked the museum.
From outside, he instructed Harvodiya which shawls to pick . Once the shawls piled up, Harvodiya broke open a window Harvodiya picks up 16 shawls that Parmar had identified earlier. He piles them on a stool nearby and fled. The cousins then left for Kolkata where Parmar’s in-laws live, leaving one of the sample shawls with Sheikh.
On the morning of October 31, when a custodian Shahjahan Ansari opened the museum he found the shawls missing and reported the matter to the police.