3 policemen including outpost in-charge arrested for embezzling seized jewellery

Simdega: Three policemen including the in-charge of Bansjore police outpost in Jharkhand’s Simdega district have been arrested for allegedly embezzling jewellery seized during a vehicle checking drive, an officer said.

Assistant Sub-Inspector Sandeep Kumar, police driver Sahid Raza Khan and the in-charge of the outpost Ashish Kumar, were arrested while ASIs Yogendra Sharma and Vijendra Kumar and an Assistant of the police outpost, Arshad Khan were being interrogated by Special Investigation Team (SIT), Superintendent of Police, Dr Shams Tabrez said on Sunday.

Apart from legal action, the SP said departmental enquiry would also continue simultaneously against them.

He said the investigation was related to silver jewellery worth lakhs of rupees seized by Bansjore police outpost personnel from a vehicle.

On October 6 Bansjore police personnel had seized silver ornaments and a silver brick weighing 38.830 kg. The ornaments and the silver brick were estimated to be valued at around Rs 25 lakh. The items were being smuggled to Ranchi from Chhattisgarh via Odisha in an SUV when it was intercepted by the police during a vehicle checking drive at Targa Maharoli on National Highway 143.

However, Chattisgarh Police informed Simdega Police that jewellery worth Rs 80 lakh was stolen from a jewellery shop in Raipur and the silver jewellery seized by Bansjore police outpost in Simdega was part of it.

They further alleged that Bansjore police has embezzled some seized jewellery.

The allegation led DIG Pankaj Kamboj to interrogate Ashish Kumar and other policemen in this regard.

Following the interrogation, SP suspended Ashish Kumar and constituted an SIT for thorough investigation into the matter.

The SIT recovered silver ornaments weighing 10 kg on the lead provided by Bansjore police outpost in-charge during interrogation.

Besides, SIT also recovered jewellery from a jeweller in Birmitrapur in Odisha following interrogation of police driver Sahid Raza Khan, the SP said, adding that a total of 14.776 kilogram silver ornaments were recovered by SIT.