Cuttack IIFL loot: 2 jewellery shop owners arrested

Cuttack: The Commissionerate Police yesterday arrested owners of two jewellery shops here for their alleged involvement in the loot of gold and cash from finance company India Info Line Finance Limited (IIFL) recently.

The two accused are Saroj Prusty (45), owner of of Renuka Jewellers in Mangalabag and Lalit Soni (25), a resident of Alamchand Bazar  and the owner of Jasoda Jewellers at Purighat. The two are associates of Lala Amrut Sagar Ray, a staff of the IIFL and the mastermind of the loot.

Both the jewellery shop owners were later produced before court yesterday.

Earlier on November 25,  police had arrested seven persons, including a woman employee of IIFL, for allegedly looting gold and cash from the finance company.

Based on a complaint lodged by IIFL Territory Manager Tapas Ranjan Swain, the police launched an investigation. During investigation it was ascertained that Lala Amrut Sagar Ray, who had been working with IIFL since 2011 as gold appraiser, has misappropriated the mortgage gold of customers and kept some of them in Manappuram Finance company. He had taken loan against the gold for his personal gain and sold some other in market.

Later,  Lala in connivance with one Ranjan Kumar Behera hatched the plan for the dacoity. Lala as well as childhood friend Nilima Lenka and Kabi Prasad Pradhan arranged four persons-Rajkishore Sahoo, Pabitra Kumar Behera, Prakash Kumar Sahoo and Santosh Bhoi to execute the  dacoity from the IIFL Branch Nayasadak.

As per their plan, the accused committed dacoity at around 10 AM on November 19 by showing a toy gun. Lala and Nilima were working as gold appraiser and branch manager, respectively .

Gold jewellery weighing over 3 kg, Rs 5 lakh cash, a Audi car and two motorcycles were seized from the possession of the accused.