In a daring dacoity executed to almost clinical perfection, a driver of a private security firm and five of his accomplice decamped with gold and diamonds worth Rs 5 crore on Friday. The suspects' carjacked the high security delivery van, which was transporting the gold and diamonds, over-powered and gagged four employees travelling in the van, took the van from Borivli to Virar. From there, they dumped the van and the gagged employees and fled with the valuables.

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A case of dacoity, robbery and kidnapping has been registered at the Kasturbha Marg Police station in Borivli (E). The police have launched a massive manhunt for the suspects; no arrests have been made in the case so far.

According to the police, prime suspect Udaybhan Singh Thakur alias Doctor, works as a driver of a firm – S.R.Security Private Limited. "This firm is involved in transporting high valuables like cash, gold, diamonds and ornaments for private firms," said a police officer.

On Friday, Thakur was asked by his superiors to go the Borivli railway station to pick up four employees, who were coming from Surat by the Gujarat Express. "Thakur was asked to pick the employees and transport the employees and the valuables to the company's office situated in BKC," the officer said. The consignment belonged to Malca Amit JK logistics private limited and was being transported from the company's Surat office to their Mumbai office in BKC, the police said.

As instructed, Thakur picked up the three employees from the station at around 3.30pm. The valuables – 3.5 kilograms of gold and 850 grams diamonds, were securely loaded in the high security strong vault of the van. While the four employees sat in the rear seats.

"Thakur got into the driver's seat and left from the station. When the van reached near the Sanjay Gandhi National Park on the Western Express Highway, Thakur reportedly stopped the van. He told the employees that there was some problem with the tyre and got-off the van on the pretext of inspecting it," said senior police inspector, Bharat Worlikar of the Kasturba police station.

Immediately after Thakur got-off, five unidentified men attacked the three employees sitting in the van, beat them up, gagged them and dumped them inside the vault of the van. "All this happened in broad daylight," said another police officer.

After this, Thakur and his five associates got into the van and fled from the spot. "They took the van to a secluded spot in Virar and opened the vault removed all the valuables. They then locked the employees in the vault and abandoned the vehicle at that secluded spot and fled from there," Worlikar said.

"After sometime, passersby heard the constant banging from inside the van. Suspecting foul play, they informed the Virar police, who rushed to the spot and opened the van," the officer said. The gagged employees were freed and rescued, who then narrated the incident to the Virar police. They were then rushed to Borivli, where the case was registered.

Driver has a past criminal record:"During the investigations, we have learnt that Thakur has a previous criminal record in our police station. He was arrested in year 2002 after he shot dead a jeweller and looted gold worth Rs65 lakhs while the deceased was travelling in an auto," Worlikar said.

"Thakur was arrested by Kasturba police on charges of murder and robbery. He was also convicted by the court. We did not find any details about Thakur in security firm. He was planning for this robbery since past two months and had deleted his records from computer in office," said an officer.