Patna, Jul 9: Four persons were on Tuesday arrested in connection with a burglary in BJP MP Giriraj Singh's house here and Rs.1.14 crore cash, 600 US dollars, gold and silver jewellery and six luxury watches purportedly stolen from there recovered, police said.
The four accused including the Nawada MP's bodyguard, domestic servant, apartment security guard and another accomplice entered his flat yesterday when he was away in Delhi, they said.
Singh, who is in Delhi for the Parliament session, was not immediately available for comments.
"It was a well planned theft. The arrested persons had inside knowledge about the valuables kept in the MP's flat.
They broke the locks, collected everything in four suitcases and decamped with the booty. They had even hired an autorickshaw to take the stolen goods," Patna Senior Superintendent of Police Manu Maharaj said.
A special investigation team was set up track the culprits and all important roads of Patna were kept under surveillance, he said.
Police were alerted about a person moving with four suitcases from Gandhi Maidan area to Sultanganj under suspicious circumstances, he said.
The accused, who was trying to flee to Hajipur, was nabbed by police and all valuables believed to have been stolen from the MP's flat were recovered from him, Maharaj said, adding, based on his inputs the others were promptly nabbed.
The alleged burglar, a man called Dinesh Kumar, was caught with a suitcase packed with Rs 1.14 crore in cash, 600 US dollars, two gold chains, a pair of gold earrings, a gold locket, three gold rings, 14 silver coins, and seven luxury watches — all of which he said he had stolen from Singh's home on Boring Road in west Patna.
However, while reporting the theft to the police on Monday, Singh is believed to have mentioned only a small fraction of this sum and “some jewellery” as having been stolen. Till late on Tuesday night, neither the MP nor any member of his family had shown up before the police to claim the cash and valuables. The MP's phone was switched off.
While the state BJP argued that it must not be assumed that the cash and valuables belonged to Singh until he said so himself,
Vijay Kumar Choudhary, a senior minister in the Bihar government, said that the case would be investigated with a view to establishing the “real owner of the cash”.
The Income-Tax department has already started an inquiry into the recovery. “It is up to the police to investigate and find the owner or owners of the recovered goods,” BJP state president Mangal Pandey said.
“Giriraj Singh had talked about the theft of only Rs 50,000 and some jewellery. Police should not believe what the thief says, but probe deeper. If the owner is not claiming the stolen goods, there is no reason why it should be assumed that they belong to him,” Pandey said.
Giriraj Singh is the BJP MP from Nawada. He is the same man who in an election speech at Deogarh in Jharkhand on April 18 said that those opposing Narendra Modi had no place in India, and should go to Pakistan.
Singh, who was an MLC before being elected to the Lok Sabha, had declared an election expenditure of Rs 27 lakh. As per Bihar government figures from January 2013, his assets at the time totalled about Rs 75 lakh, which included the market value of his properties in Patna and Begusarai.
Singh was animal husbandry minister in then Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's NDA government until the JD(U) split with the BJP in June 2013. He had always been a vocal supporter of Narendra Modi.
Patna Senior Superintendent of Police Manu Maharaj said: “Though the MP had not mentioned that this much amount was stolen from his house, the arrested thief Dinesh said the money and goods were stolen from the MP's house”. The SSP said Dinesh had committed the theft in connivance with the MP's bodyguard Rupkamal, guard Dhirendra, and domestic help Lakshman. “They had planned the theft 15 days ago,” he said. All three alleged accomplices have been arrested as well.
According to Maharaj, Dinesh, who has several cases of theft against him, had promised the other three a “good share” of the booty. He was picked up after police spotted him travelling in a vehicle “in a suspicious manner, tightly holding a suitcase”.
“He was probably going to hide the stolen money somewhere,” Maharaj said.
Police calimed that the total recovery comprising the valuables and the cash is around Rs.two crore.
Meanwhile, SSP Manu Maharaj said the police has informed the Income Tax (IT) Department about the huge amount of cash belonging to the MP. The taxmen have started their investigations into the matter.
"As a normal procedure whenever we recover a big amount of cash, we have informed the IT Department. It has sent a team and has started probing the matter. As far as the recovery of dollars is concerned, we will decided in a couple of days whether to inform the Enforcement Directorate (ED)," said Maharaj.
The issue has provided an opportunity to JD(U) against its rival BJP.
"How this much of cash was kept at Giriraj Singh's house and from where it came should be probed. The police should investigate this," Water Resources Minister Vijay Kumar Chaudhary told reporters.
State Food and Civil Supplies Minister Shyam Rajak alleged that Singh had kept the money to give it to top BJP leaders to become a minister in the Union cabinet.
"The matter should be investigated. This is not a normal amount of money. Did Singh keep it with himself to pay to somebody to become a minister or is it part of some conspiracy by former Deputy Chief Minister and BJP leader Sushil Kumar Modi to discredit Singh because his name was cropping up as a potential Union Minister," Rajak said.
Giriraj Singh could not be contacted over the issue.
He is said to be in New Delhi and his mobile is switched off.
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