DU MPhil graduate arrested for jewelry shop robberies

The Delhi Police on Sunday arrested a 32-year-old man holding an MPhil in Chemistry from the Delhi University for his alleged involvement in two jewelry shop burglaries in the Model Town area in the northwest of the city, police said.

According to the police, the accused, Deep Shubham, who hails from Bihar’s Sitamarhi, is currently living in Sohna, Haryana. He is a proclaimed offender in two robbery cases and was previously convicted in a 2017 bank robbery in his home state.

Advertisement

“Shubham was arrested from the Hari Nagar area in Sohna on Saturday. During a bank robbery in Bihar, he used his chemistry expertise to create a smoke bomb,” said Harsh Indora, Deputy Commissioner of Police (Crime Branch).

The police said the accused had completed his BSc (Hons), MSc, and MPhil in Chemistry from Delhi University and had also briefly studied law in Visakhapatnam.

“In 2021, Shubham and his associates committed two armed robberies at jewelry shops in the Gujranwala area. In one case, they looted over ₹6 lakh in cash and mobile phones at gunpoint, and in another, they fled with ₹70,000 after threatening the staff,” the officer said.

After securing bail in the Delhi cases, Shubham went into hiding and frequently changed his location to evade arrest.

“He was recently tracked down and apprehended by the team. At the time of his arrest, he was working as an interior designer at a private firm in Sohna,” the officer added.

In 2017, Shubham carried out a robbery at a government bank in Bihar’s Pupri area, where he used a homemade smoke bomb—crafted using methyl acetate and benzene—to create panic and escaped with approximately Rs 3.6 lakh in cash, police said.