Land mafia Bali Dangar hid in Morbi for 7 months: Rajkot police

Bali and his three accomplices — Arjun Jalu, Arjun Dangar and Sikundar Bloch — were arrested by a team of officers of city police from Rampara Beti village on November 28. Bali had jumped bail in July 2015 and had been on the run since. While being on the run, he was booked in at least three cases of kidnapping criminal intimidation and under Arms Act. After arresting the quartet, police had seized two country-made pistols and 13 cartridges from them and booked them under Arms Act.

During interrogation, Bali told Crime Branch that he had spent almost seven months at a premise belonging to one Hanif Memon alias Mammu Dadhi in Morbi while he was on the run. Based on this information, a team of Crime Branch took the 32-year-old history-sheeter to Morbi on Saturday evening.

“Bali had taken shelter in a room above Dadhi’s office in Khatkivad area of Morbi town for about seven months, divided into two periods. During a search of the room, we discovered four pen-drives, six CDs, one memory card and a dongle. These items have been seized for the purpose of investigation. We shall sent them to Forensic Science Laboratory to get details of their contents,” Crime Branch police inspector Hitesh Gadhvi told mediapersons on Sunday. He further said that Dadhi was a scrap dealer of Morbi and that he had been booked by police in assault case in the past. But he was not found at the premises at the time of raid, he added.

Incidentally, Crime Branch had recovered six mobile phones, a video camera and a laptop from a cottage on the agricultural field of one Haresh Koli in Morthala village near Thangadh in Surendranagar district on November 28. Bali and his accomplices had been hiding in this cottage and were caught when they were trying to change their location, police said.