Mumbai Crime: Duo held for tying up Andheri couple, looting them at gunpoint

Victim Ebrahim Chaudhary; (left) main accused Mahesh Chaudhary

The MIDC police have arrested two of the four people who had barged into the house of an Andheri-based couple last month and looted them of Rs 17 lakh at gunpoint. Investigation has revealed that the main accused was earlier arrested in a murder case in 2017 after the victim helped the cops identify an eyewitness in the case. The victim claims that the accused looted him to take revenge.

The victim, identified as Ebrahim Chaudhary, 45, is a resident of SRA Rustomjee Society in Andheri East, where even main accused Mahesh Chaudhary resides. Mahesh was arrested in 2017 for killing a man by the name Mukesh over a property dispute. The second arrested accused has been identified as Deepak Raina, who was earlier nabbed in house break-in cases and had met Mahesh in jail, where they had planned the robbery.

According to the police, the incident happened on January 17 when the four people wearing masks entered Ebrahim's house around 12.30 pm.

Speaking to mid-day, Ebrahim said, "They tied us up with cellotape and demanded '10 lakh. When I refused to give them anything, they searched the house and looted us of '17 lakh cash and gold jewellery."

"Mahesh was earlier arrested in 2017 for killing Mukesh, who lived in our society. Mahesh took him to Palghar, killed him and threw his body in the river. The Talasari police had registered a case. One of the witnesses was Mahesh's friend who had gone to Palghar with him. I informed the police about the witness and then Mahesh was arrested. He was in jail till December last year. After being released he threatened me a number of times." Ebrahim further said.

"He robbed me to take revenge but luckily he just took jewellery and money. He could have killed us," he added.

When contacted, PSI Sandeep Randive said, "Based on the footage recovered from 35-40 CCTV cameras we traced the main accused to Vashi and the other one to Gujarat. The main accused has two murder cases against him and the other person has five robbery cases against him."