Trio robs man at Kalyan railway station after giving him spiked cold drink, held

Beware of strangers trying to get friendly at railway stations. They might just turn out to be thieves, waiting to give you a spiked drink and run away with all your belongings. After a passenger was robbed in a similar manner at Kalyan railway station on September 25, the Mumbai Railway Protection Force (RPF) launched a search operation and arrested three people involved in the incident.

Two of them were picked up from Kalyan station, the kingpin was arrested later

According to the police, the trio has been identified as Ramchandra Matasaran Yadav, 50, Usman Hakimmulla Ansari, 40, and Suresh Balkrishna Gadekar, 35. Yadav, who was the kingpin of the gang, used to plan all the robberies.

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Friendly strangers
In a recent case, Rahul Vishwakarma, a garage mechanic from Ulhasnagar, was travelling to his native place Banaras when the trio robbed him. While he was buying his ticket at Kalyan railway station, Ansari and Gadekar went up to him and initiated a conversation. After talking to him for some time, they convinced him to have a bottle of cold drink, in which they had already added some sleeping pills. On drinking it, Rahul became unconscious, and the duo fled away with his belongings worth Rs 16,500. It included Rs 8,000 cash, two mobile phones, a gold nose ring and clothes.

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Speaking to mid-day, Rahul's brother Vinod Vishwakarma said, "I could not contact Rahul over phone the day he was supposed to reach Banaras. The following day I called up at his home, but he had not reached. That is when I filed a complaint with the Kalyan GRP. The next day he called me up and narrated the entire story." Soon after the incident, the RPF formed a team and launched a search operation at the Kalyan railway station and nearby areas. They even circulated the CCTV footage recovered from the spot.

Cops get suspicious
An RPF officer said, "We had deployed two of our officers as dummy passengers at Kalyan railway station. While on duty they spotted two men who were trying to be friendly with a passenger. Though they were detained on suspicion, later they confessed to the crime. However, the kingpin was still at large."

Also read: Senior citizen drugged and robbed in Pune-Mumbai state transport bus

Finally on October 2, police arrested Yadav and recovered four bottles of juice and 13 sleeping pills from him. The Kalyan GRP registered an FIR against the accused under sections 328 (causing hurt by means of poison, etc., with intent to commit an offence), 379 (punishment for theft) and 34 (common intention) of IPC on October 7.

Also read - Woman offered spiked drink, raped; accused films act and threatens her

Rs 16.5k
Worth of the goods robbed from Rahul

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