BENGALURU: A 27-year-old woman follower of an astrologer and her five associates have been arrested on charges of robbing the fortune-teller of 400 grams of gold and Rs 5 lakh cash at knife-point on July 9.
Astrologer Pramod HR, 45, filed a complaint with Kengeri police saying five men robbed him after barging into his residence near Kengeri railway station. A bachelor, Pramod lives alone.
The accused are S Meghana of Lakkasandra in Adugodi, Dominic Richard alias Richard, 25, of Adugodi, S Raju, 22, and his younger brother S Suresh from Wilson Garden, M Suresh alias Padam, 21, of Shantinagar and M Vinod alias Chummi, 24, of Wilson Garden.
Police records show that Dominic, Suresh and Vinod have robbery cases against them. Preliminary investigation revealed that Dominic is a close friend of Meghana, who has separated from her husband.
“Meghana met Pramod during a get-together held near Madiwala around six months ago. Pramod had purchased gold using the money he had earned from astrology and had kept it at home. Meghana, who was aware of this, asked Pramod for a hand loan of Rs 5 lakh. But Pramod refused saying he wanted to purchase a site and was in need of money. Meghana and Domnic then decided to rob Pramod,” police sources said, adding that Pramod would store the gold in a safe placed inside the room where he worked and keep the cash earnings inside his cupboard.
According to their plan, Meghana was to visit Pramod and on confirming that he was alone and had no visitors at home, would alert Domnic, who’d be waiting nearby.
“Everything went according to their plan. Meghana told Pramod that she was making a casual visit. While Pramod was busy with work, the five men barged in and threatened him at knife-point. They walked straight into the office room, picked the safe and Rs 5 lakh cash from the cupboard and fled. Meghana was with Pramod until he finished filing the police complaint. Meanwhile, the five men drove to Sedam in Kalaburagi in Suresh’s vehicle with the safe. They occupied a hotel room and spent from the stolen cash,” police sources said.
“Meghana was in continuous touch with Domnic and others, updating them about the developments. We cracked the entire case by tracking her,” said police.
Cops recovered the gold (400 grams), which was intact in the safe and Rs 64,000 cash. Police are investigating what happened to the rest of the stolen money.
