Another alleged robber involved in the jewellery shop heist in West Burdwan’s Raniganj town was arrested during a combined search by Bengal and Jharkhand cops from a hideout in Giridih on Monday night.

Police said Sonu Singh, a resident of Siwan in Bihar, is a noted criminal with involvement in several similar crimes in the past.

He had suffered a bullet injury in the gunfight that took with the police during the heist in Raniganj.

This is the second arrest after police earlier on Sunday night arrested Suraj Singh from Giridih and recovered the hijacked car in which the criminals were fleeing.

“He suffered a bullet injury in the lower portion of his body during a gunfight with us. He was probably leading the gang during the jewellery shop heist. He fired at the police when we tried to intercept them,” said a police officer in Asansol-Durgapur police commissionerate.

After his arrest, Singh was admitted to Burdwan Medical College and Hospital police cell. Police said Sonu was a relative of Suraj and worked under a Bihar-based gang that mainly targeted jewellery shops and gold financing companies.

On Sunday, a gang of seven to eight armed robbers barged into a jewellery shop in Raniganj and got involved in a gunfight with police when the cops tried to intercept them.

The robbers while escaping in three motorbikes hijacked one private car from Asansol after injuring its owner and fled to Jharkhand.

Sources said they also managed to decamp with gold ornaments worth Rs 2.08 crore. The police managed to recover a major portion of the stolen gold jewellery from Sonu and Suraj.

A team of forensic experts and CID officers visited the jewellery shop in Raniganj on Tuesday. The forensic experts collected samples from the shop.