‘Be wary of inside help’

Chances are the domestic help who does ‘jhadoo-pochha’ in your house may have questionable antecedents. Would registering her with the local police station help?

That’s the question uppermost after Mulund police recently cracked a Rs 23.50 lakh dacoity abetted by ‘inside help’ from four domestic helps. 

On August 31, nine persons broke into a flour mill owner, Gaurishankar Gupta’s bungalow in Veena Nagar, Mulund. Gupta was not at his residence and his aged mother and wife were soft targets.

They tied the two with rope and fled with booty worth Rs23.50 lakh in Gupta’s Innova. Investigations showed two of the nine arrested had worked at the Guptas’ residence and had been sacked because of suspect behaviour. The four arrested domestic helps, identified as Ramesh, Ram, Karan and Umeshs were charged with dacoity.

Gupta erred, in that he had no proper records of the four that worked for him, nor did he seek to know their credentials before employing them.

Deputy Commissioner of Police Dattatray Karale (Zone VII) said the suspects were rounded up from Delhi after being tipped off they were Bihar natives. The stolen booty was also recovered from them.

“Although police keep issuing circulars to housing societies, few bother to inform the police about the details of their domestic help(s). Many manage to gain the trust of their employers in due course and later rob them,” Karale added

In Gupta’s case, the four provided inside information to the others who plotted and executed the dacoity.