Frequent changes of hideouts did not help. Prince Das (Big Prince), the brother of Bihar's notorious jailed criminal Rakesh Das, involved in the gold shop robbery and murder case in Baranagar, has finally been caught in the police net. Police arrested him from a secret hideout in Bihar on Thursday night. His father, Ranjit Das, has also been arrested by the police on charges of involvement in the incident. Both were brought to Barrackpore on Friday night on transit remand. Today, on Saturday, they will be produced in the Barrackpore court. With this, police have arrested seven people, including the main conspirator of the incident, Sanjay Maity.
Police investigation revealed that Rakesh, imprisoned in Presidency jail, wanted to expand his criminal empire while sitting in jail. Accordingly, he chose Sanjay Maity as the head of this state. However, to ensure control remained in his hands, he also appointed his own brother and father to criminal activities. It was agreed that Sanjay would pay Rakesh a fixed amount of money for each job. In return, Rakesh would supply criminals from other states for robberies. Accordingly, Sanjay had handed over seven lakh rupees to the father of the Bihar criminal in the Baranagar robbery and murder incident.
On the night after the robbery on October 4, Rakesh's father, Ranjit, came to Kolkata to collect that money. As per Sanjay's instructions, another arrested person, Surjit Sikdar, a resident of Narkeldanga, handed over the money to him. Meanwhile, detectives from Barrackpore police have interrogated Rakesh in Presidency jail. Rakesh has admitted to the police that he wanted to continue his criminal empire from jail through his father and brother. Following his elder brother's instructions, brother Prince came to Baranagar with Chandan Mandal and Prince Kumar from Jharkhand. His father, Ranjit's job was to look after the financial aspect.
During interrogation, police learned that after robbing and murdering Shankar Nagen Jana (63) at his shop on Shambhunath Das Lane in Baranagar, Prince Das, Chandan, and Prince Kumar first went to Konnagar. From there, they took a train to Howrah and split up to Bihar and Jharkhand. Sanjay went to the house of Panchu Samanta, a resident of Bediapara. Keeping the gold jewellery, Panchu gave 10 lakh rupees to Sanjay. Keeping 3 lakh rupees for himself, Sanjay gave the remaining 7 lakh rupees to Surjit. He gave that money to Rakesh's father. Taking 7 lakh rupees back to Bihar, Ranjit gave 1 lakh rupees each to Prince Kumar and Chandan Mandal, residents of Jharkhand. The remaining 5 lakh rupees were with him.
Police have arrested Ranjit and already seized 4 lakh 80 thousand rupees from him. However, brother Prince did not take any money for this job. Because during the robbery itself, he had filled his pockets with jewellery. Barrackpore Police Commissioner Murlidhar Sharma said, "We have largely closed the investigation net. One more criminal is still outside. We hope to arrest him soon as well."
