Scrap dealer returns gold junked during cleaning

GURGAON: Haji Akhtar Khan picked honesty over a windfall. And the Sharmas got their Diwali gift, six months late.

Khan, a scrap dealer in Faridabad, returned to the family nearly 100 gram of gold jewellery worth about Rs 15 lakh that had been accidentally sold off with household trash before Diwali.

The family of Ashok Sharma, an electrician, realised the ornaments had gone missing while preparing for Lakshmi puja in Oct last year. The jewellery, mostly bangles and earrings, were kept in a small box and placed inside a sack at home before the family left for Kumbh Mela in Jan. It was an effort to keep the valuables safe from theft. During routine pre-Diwali cleaning, however, the sack was mistakenly thrown out and sold as scrap.

The trash went to Khan (60).

From scrap to rightful owner

Khan has been running a scrap business since 1992 on Agra Canal Road.

Suspecting the baby had been inadvertently thrown out with the bathwater, Sharma visited Khan two to three times over the following months to inquire if he had found anything but returned empty handed.

Recalling what had happened, Khan said Sharma had come to his shop about two months before Diwali to sell some scrap. “He came in his own vehicle during house cleaning and sold off the scrap,” Khan said.

When the family came back roughly two months later, Khan said he did not store CCTV footage from his shop that old. “Had they approached within 20 to 30 days of the scrap being sold, we could have checked the cameras. By the time they approached us, we had deleted the footage,” he added.

The turning point came earlier this week when Khan, while sifting through scrap at his shop, noticed a plastic packet. “Someone might have kept it there thinking it was brass. But I had my suspicion,” he said.

Khan got the packet checked by a jeweller. “He confirmed it was gold — 22 carat — about 100 gram. I was sure it belonged to Sharma ji and no one else. So, it had to be returned. We earn through hard work and cannot keep someone else’s property. My family also agreed with me.” The scrap dealer took the jewellery to a police station to ensure a proper handover.

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