Thane: Five men, including a Thane Rural police constable, have been arrested for allegedly robbing an angadia service company’s cash van of Rs 61.5 lakh on the Mumbai-Nashik Highway near Khardi village in Shahapur in the wee hours of Monday. The stolen cash has not yet been recovered.Police suspect that seven to eight more persons were involved in the robbery, and some of them hailed from Gujarat.On August 23, Govind Patel (43), a resident of Surat who works as a van driver for Gwalior-based K P Angadia Company, and Jigar Patel left Gwalior for the company’s Malad office carrying Rs 1 crore cash. After stopping for dinner at Khardi, when they resumed their journey around 1.15am on August 24, three men, who claimed to be crime branch officers, allegedly intercepted their van and asked them to accompany them to a police chowky. The accused allegedly seized the vehicle’s keys, forced Govind and Jigar onto the middle seat of the van, and assaulted them. They drove the van towards Nashik before turning back towards Mumbai.The victims further alleged that the accused stopped near a closed hotel, assaulted them again, and fled with Rs 61.5 lakh from the cash consignment in a white car.An FIR was registered at Shahapur police station under various sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita. Based on CCTV footage and technical details, Shahapur police tracked down five of the accused, including the constable.Senior inspector Vilas Kadam of Shahapur police station confirmed the arrests but refused to reveal their identities, saying disclosure could alert their aides on the run. Kadam said efforts were on to recover the cash and arrest the absconding accused.
