22 June,2011 06:41 AM IST | | Sayed Roshan
After MiD DAY reported about the dead woman who was robbed in her coffin while her body was being transported from Singapore to Mumbai, the Bandra police swung into action and filed an FIR against unknown person(s), 11 days after the complaint was lodged.
Yesterday, this paper had published the story ('Woman robbed from coffin after death', June 21) about how gold jewels and hard cash were stolen from Conception D'souza's (in pic) coffin, being brought from Singapore to Mumbai.
Conception (60) died in Singapore on June 5, while she was on her way back to Mumbai from New Zealand. When her body reached Mumbai on June 7, gold ornaments and some cash were found to be missing from her coffin.
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Her son, Ashley, lodged a complaint with the Bandra police on June 10, but they hadn't taken cognisance of it until yesterday.
"The police have finally decided to take action against the accused and have registered the FIR. I hope that they arrest the culprit soon," said Ashley, adding, "The jewels were my mother's memories."
Ashley was made to run around between Bandra and Sahar police stations for lodging a complaint. At last, after MiD DAY's report, cops filed the theft case.
In the FIR (copy with MiD DAY), the worth of the pinched belongings is about Rs 90,000. The place of occurrence in the FIR is still not clear.
The cash and jewels could have been filched in India or in Singapore, cops said. Cops are thus betting that the valuables must have been pilfered mid-flight, or at either of the airports. They said that they would collect all details from the airports, including the scanned copies of the coffin.
Incidentally, officials claimed that in the event of a death overseas, the deceased's belongings are always sent separately and nothing is kept in the coffin, matter which they are investigating into.
"This is the first time that the valuables have been sent inside the coffin. Usually the belongings are sent separately.
The mischief has been done between Singapore and Sahar airports. A case has been registered against unknown person(s) under Sec 379 of the IPC," said Inspector DS Patil.
