Jeweller wards off robbery bid, suffers bullet injury

Vadodara: Despite suffering a bullet injury, a jeweller confronted a gang of four robbers who tried to loot his bag full of cash in Nizampura area late on Sunday night. Bhavesh Soni, who owns a jewellery shop in Chhani, suffered a bullet injury on his leg after one of the accused opened fire at him from a country-made pistol.

In his complaint to Fatehgunj police station, Soni said he left his shop at about 9.30pm in his car and stopped at a restaurant on the way. After packing some food, Soni reached his residential colony in Nizampura area about 10 pm.

“When I came out of the car and was about to pick up my bag that had Rs 1.50 lakh cash and some jewellery, two men approached me on a motorbike. One of them tried to snatch the bag from the car but I closed the vehicle’s door and locked the car,” Soni told TOI.

When the robbers got into a scuffle with him, Soni hit one of them with the food parcel he was carrying.

“One of them suddenly took out a pistol and fired at me. I got hit on my leg after which which I raised alarm. Two other men came on a motorbike and all the four then fled from the spot,” 43-year-old Soni said.

There was not much movement of people in the residental colony which mostly has bungalows.

The police said that they went through the CCTV footage of the area after the incident to get clues about the accused. Police said that they have got images of two of the accused but their faces aren’t clearly visible.

It appeared that the gang of four had been following Soni after he left his shop and they were waiting for the right opportunity to loot him.

The cops are trying to trace the accused on the basis of the motorbike’s license plate number.

Soni said that all the accused were aged between 25 to 30 years and though they were masked, he had never seen them in his shop in the past.