Bhubaneswar: The police have arrested a nine-member gang on charges of robbing people on the pretext of polishing gold jewellery in Odisha’s Rourkela city.

Of the nine arrested persons, seven are the residents of Bihar. They have robbed several people in the Steel City and other areas of Sundargarh district in last three years, said the police.

The police have seized around 100 grams of gold jewellery, eight mobile phones and three bikes from the arrested persons. Members of the gang were also active in Deogarh, Jharsuguda and Sambalpur districts, they added.

According to police, at least five members of the gang—Amit Shah (30), Goutam Soni (33), Kundan Shah (41), Dhanangjay Sharma (32) and Arvind Soni (30) of Bhagalpur area in Bihar and Amit Kumar (30) of Godda district in Jharkhand—had arrived in Rourkela in October 2021.

The six accused were staying at the residential building of Ashok Yadav (42) of Gopabandhupalli area on rent. They were duping people and fleeing with the gold ornaments on the pretext of cleaning and polishing them, police said.

Members of the gang were selling the gold ornaments looted from the Steel City in Odisha to two jewelers—Anil Kumar (49) and Mehraj Haldar (36)—of Bhagalpur in Bihar.

Two members of the gang were caught by the police while they were fleeing with the looted gold jewellery from Udit Nagar area of Rourkela on October 24.

After interrogating the accused duo, the police managed to arrest the other four members of the gang. The cops later nabbed the two jewellers from Bhagalpur and the landlord who had rented out his building to the members of the gang at Gopabandhupalli in Rourkela.

Members of the gang were involved in at least 21 cases of duping at various places in the Steel City in last three years, police said.