CHENNAI: Police on Wednesday shot one of two chain-snatchers they had arrested from Chennai airport on Tuesday in a dramatic fashion, pulling one off a plane about to leave for Hyderabad and picking up the other from a queue to board a flight to Mumbai.
Chennai city police commissioner A Arun said Jaffer Gulam Hussain Irani, 28, was shot dead when he pulled out a gun from the bike used for the snatchings after police took him to recover the vehicle, parked at an isolated spot beneath an MRTS pillar at Taramani, early on Wednesday. Irani was a top-ranking member of the Irani gang from Maharashtra’s Thane. He and Meesan Amjith Irani, 23, had flown in from Mumbai early on Tuesday, picked up a bike from an accomplice and between 6am and 7am snatched chains of six elderly women who were out on morning walk at Saidapet, Adyar and Guindy, not far from the airport.
Commissioner Arun said Jaffer Gulam and Meesan Amjith hid their motorcycle and took a cab to the airport. On the way they changed their clothes, but not their shoes. “We identified them (from the CCTV footage) because they did not change their shoes,” said Arun.
Their accomplice, Salman Hussain, 25, of MP’s Barwani, was nabbed at Ongole railway station in Andhra after he fled Chennai on Pinakini Express.
The commissioner said a police team took Hussein Irani to recover the bike bearing Karnataka number plaste. He pulled out a country-made pistol hidden beneath the bike cover and fired twice. “In self-defence, the inspector shot him ,” he added.