As per DCP Makrand Ranade (Zone 11), “During our enquiries, we suspected one Jaspal Singh alias Jassi, who used to work as a driver for Sophia Bijla, the daughter-in-law of the complainants. During interrogations he confessed to have given the information about the valuables in the house to three of his friends. He also said that they had planned to rob the household at an appropriate time by posing as delivery men from the nearby chemist shop which regularly provided medicines to Ramchandra Bijla, the husband of the complainant.”

Acting on the information provided by Jassi, the police arrested the three men, later identified as Sompal Valmiki (30), Jogidar Rajpal Badlan (25) and Amresh Jha (25). Police Inspector Deepak Phatangare from the Malad police station said, “We got information that the three men would be found near Andheri and based on the tip off we laid a trap and arrested the three. We also recovered around Rs 26, 61, 000 from the trio.”

Phatangare added, “Jassi had been working as a driver for Sophia for the past four years even before she got married to Sanjay- son of Ramchandra. After marriage Sophia insisted that Jassi should work for her. Jassi had befriended everyone in the family.” As per Phatangare, Jassi knew that there were a lot of valuables in the house in the wake of a puja that was supposed to take place on Sunday. Knowing this, Jassi contacted his nephew, Sompal, who worked as a sweeper at Laxmi Industrial estate in Andheri and they both planned to rope in more men and rob the household.

Phatangare said, “At the outset, we observed that Jassi would not leave any opportunity to show interest in the progress of the investigation and would shower praises on the Bijla family. We found this quite suspicious. We are conducting enquiries to trace the remaining valuables.”