Mumbai: In two separate incidents at Kandivli (E) and Borivli (W), two women were robbed of their jewellery by ‘policemen’ on Saturday morning. The cases were registered at Samata Nagar and Borivli police stations. Police suspect the same duo of being involved in both the cases.
According to police sources, in the first incident, a Vasai-based woman, who did not wish to be named, was on her way to meet relatives at Thakur Complex in Kandivli (E) on Saturday.
Around 8.40am, when she reached St Lawrence School, a man, who identified himself as a policeman warned her of the consequences of walking alone on the street wearing gold jewellery.
He asked her to take off her gold chain and bangles and put them in a plastic bag to prevent their being snatched. Even as the woman began removing her bangles valued at Rs1.18 lakh, the man snatched them and fled. Before the woman realised what had transpired, he had hopped on his accomplice’s motorcycle and vanished.
The woman immediately approached the Samata Nagar police station and registered a complaint. She described the appearance of the two accused men, after which police booked them under relevant sections of the IPC. Police said they are checking the CCTV footages of neighbouring areas, as there was no CCTV at the spot where the case occurred.
In a similar incident, a senior citizen, Sheela Shah, 70, was robbed using the same modus operandi. Shah was on her way to the Jain temple at Chandavarkar Road in Borivli (W) on Saturday morning.
According to her complaint, when Shah neared the Indian Overseas Bank, around 9am, she was approached by a biker, in his mid-30s, who claimed to be a policeman and suggested to Shah it was unsafe to move about wearing so much gold jewellery.
Shah said, “The impostor then asked her to remove her gold bangles and put them in a plastic bag to keep it safe from chainsnatchers, while another man was standing afar.
When the senior citizen put her ornaments in the bag, the policeman waved at her and left with the onlooker. Minutes later, when Shah checked the plastic bag, she was shocked, as the ornaments were missing,” said a police officer.
Shah then realised she was robbed and approached Borivli police, who booked two unidentified men for cheating her and decamping with gold bangles worth Rs1.65 lakh. Police are probing the case.
