The police could not arrest anyone even after two days of theft of jewelry worth three and a half crore rupees from a diamond shop in the capital’s Dhanmondi area. However, the police say that they have identified six people involved in the theft by analyzing the footage from the CCTV camera.
The lock of a diamond shop named Trust Diamond on the third floor of Metro Shopping Mall in Dhanmondi No. 32 was taken last Sunday early by cutting the lock of diamond jewelry worth around three-quarter crore rupees. In that case, the shop’s manager, Palash Saha, filed a theft report with the Dhanmondi police station.
According to the complaint, five-six unidentified persons smashed the lock and entered the business around 10:08 a.m. last Sunday. They left with ornaments at 10:18. The jewelry stolen included 242 diamond knuckles, 350 rings, 177 lockets, 136 pairs of earrings, 69 necklaces, 39 bangles, 9 bracelets, and 20 gold chains. The estimated price of these is 2 crore 70 lakh 30 thousand takas.
Officer-in-charge of Dhanmondi police station.
Parvez Islam told Prothom Alo on Tuesday afternoon that there are CCTV cameras in that shop. Six people have been identified by analyzing the footage of these cameras. Efforts are underway to arrest them.
In response to the question of how the theft took place even though some of the shops were open at the time of the theft, police officer Parvez Islam said that the diamond shop was located next to the toilet. So there was a crowd of people. Thieves have used this opportunity.
Palash Saha, the manager of the shop, went there at 10.22 am that day and found two locks of the shop open. He quickly reported the theft to the Dhanmondi police station through the employees. At that time, two teams of Dhanmondi police station-police and the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) of the police went to the spot. After the police inspection, Palash Saha found the goods inside the shop being destroyed.
Palash Saha told Prothom Alo that today (Tuesday) the market is closed for the week. He filed the case last Sunday night.
Ramana Division of the Detective Police is investigating the shadow of the case of theft. Additional Deputy Commissioner of that department Fazle Elahi told Prothom Alo this afternoon that they believe that these thieves may be members of a gang outside Dhaka.
Dhaka Metropolitan Police has developed a database of 50 police stations through a software called Identification and Verification System (SIVS). Its data says that there are 3 thousand 610 thieves, 1 thousand 737 robbers, and 4 thousand 461 robbers in Dhaka.
Diamond jewelry worth Rs 2 crore stolen from a shop in Dhanmondi in 10 minutes
A commercial diamond shop in the capital’s Dhanmondi was stolen. This incident happened on Sunday morning. In just 10 minutes, the members of the thieves’ gang stole about 2 crores worth of diamonds.
Officer-in-Charge (OC) of Dhanmondi Police Station Parvez Islam told Prothom Alo that the owner of the shop complained that diamond jewelry was stolen from a shop on the fourth floor of Metro Shopping Mall in Dhanmondi. The footage of the CCTV camera showed that the members of the thief gang entered the shop at 10:08 am by cutting the lock on the shutter. After 10 minutes they left the shop.
Parvez Islam said that efforts are being made to identify the thieves by looking at the CCTV footage. The process of the case is going on in this case.
The diamond market of the mysterious country
The heyday of diamond jewelry export from Bangladesh was five or six years ago. Along with exports, these precious gems were also imported to meet the demand of the domestic market. However, for four years, the import of diamonds has decreased to lakhs of rupees. Businessmen say that despite the decrease in imports, diamond jewelry worth 5000 crore rupees is being sold annually in the country.
There are no diamond mines in the country. There is no production. As the sale of this gem has increased to 5000 crore rupees without import, a mystery has been created around the diamond market. Conversations with diamond traders revealed two things. One. Like gold, diamonds are smuggled from India to evade duty. Two. In the name of real diamonds, the sellers are handing over the lab-made fake diamonds to the buyers. Mozzanite or zircon stones that look like diamonds are also sold under the name of real diamonds.
Gold is at the top of the precious jewelry market in Bangladesh. Diamond jewelry stores started two decades ago, but initially, this market was limited to high-class buyers. However, over the past five years, the sale of diamond jewelry has increased.
As was the golden day
In May 2007, the first smooth diamond export from Bangladesh was reported. Brilliant Heera Limited of HRC Industrial Estate, Savare Mirzanagar exported its first shipment worth one and a half million dollars or one crore rupees to Belgium. Rough diamonds are imported from Belgium and processed in factories in the country. Then the first shipment was again exported to Belgium. Exports started from there.
Renaissance Jewelry Bangladesh Limited entered the export market after Brilliant. This Indian investment firm in Adamjee Export Processing Zone is used to import processed diamonds and make jewelry of various designs. They started exporting this jewelry. The world’s second-largest diamond importing country, their export started with the US market. The company then exported to Hong Kong, United Arab Emirates, and India. In all, they exported diamond jewelry worth 3 crore 87 million dollars.
The mystery started in 2019
The last year 2018 saw imports of diamonds as high as exports. Diamond World Limited imported two consignments of 3,000-carat rough diamonds that year. In the same year, ten companies including Diamond World imported diamonds worth 140 thousand dollars.