City dacoities: 4 tribal gang members held
Suspects nabbed in Krishnanagar area in wee hours of Saturday, 3 including gang leader escape
LUCKNOW: The city police claimed to have solved the back-to-back dacoities reported in Chinhat, Kakori and Malihabad, after arresting four suspects during an encounter in Krishnanagar area in the wee hours of Saturday. The arrested men belong to a nomadic tribal gang of Rajasthan. The gang leader and two others managed to escape under the cover of darkness. Police said two of the arrested accused were injured in retaliatory police firing, and four firearms and 15 cartridges were recovered from the gang members.
LUCKNOW: The city police claimed to have solved the back-to-back dacoities reported in Chinhat, Kakori and Malihabad, after arresting four suspects during an encounter in Krishnanagar area in the wee hours of Saturday. The arrested men belong to a nomadic tribal gang of Rajasthan. The gang leader and two others managed to escape under the cover of darkness.
Police said two of the arrested accused were injured in retaliatory police firing, and four firearms and 15 cartridges were recovered from the gang members.
“The arrested have been identified as Rajesh, Manoj, Mahendra alias Mahesh and Ramesh alias Raju. Mahendra and Manoj suffered injuries in the leg during the exchange of fire between the gang and the police. The other two surrendered after being surrounded and finding no escape route,” said inspector of Krishnanagar police station, Anjani Kumar Pandey.
He said three others -- gang leader Vinod alias Chotu, Rakesh alias Kalia and Ramveer -- managed to evade arrest and fled the spot.
› They belong to a tribal community of Rajasthan .They prefer committing dacoities in semiurban and rural areas with forest cover. DEEPAK KUMAR, SSP, Lucknow
The inspector said the gang was planning to commit another dacoity in a semi-urban pocket of Krishnanagar when the police intercepted them.
“The members have confessed to their gang’s involvement in at least 12 recent dacoities, including six incidents in Lucknow in which two people were killed. The gang also committed three crimes each in Barabanki and Farrukhabad districts in December 2017 and January 2018,” said Pandey.
Explaining the gang’s modus operandi, senior superintendent of police (SSP), Lucknow, Deepak Kumar said, “They belong to a tribal community of Rajasthan. The gang prefers committing dacoities in semi-urban and rural areas with forest cover, such as, Chinhat, Malihabad and Kakori,” he said.
“They also carry firearms, rods and canes to attack people if faced with resistance. Unlike Bawariya or Pardi tribal gangs, they frequently open fire during dacoities -- either to overcome resistance or to escape,” the SSP added.
Kumar said a police team was sent to the gang members’ native places in Rajasthan’s Jhunjhunu, Alwar and Mahendragarh districts to collect more details about them. “Efforts are on to arrest the other members of the gang,” he said.
To recall, the state capital was rocked by a series of dacoities starting from December last year. The first incident occurred in Chinhat on the intervening night of December 24-25, 2017. The dacoits again targeted Chinhat on January 18, this year.
Later, they struck two villages in Kakori -- Baniyakheda and Katauli -- on the intervening night of January 20-21. Here they shot dead Abhishek alias Komal, son of Katauli village head Hari Shankar Yadav, injured nine people, and looted cash and valuables worth Rs 10 lakh from five houses.
On January 23, dacoits again struck several houses in Sarava village of Mahilabad. One person was killed in the incident.