Businessman mugged near police station in Bandra (E)

Mumbai: A businessman who resides at Kalanagar in Bandra (East) needed 18 stitches on his head and face after three men brutally assaulted him for his 20-gram gold chain on Wednesday. 

    Rajkumar Agarwal, 54, a pharma dealer, was on his morning walk when he was attacked by three men who came in an autorickshaw. 

    The incident occurred a stone's throw from the heavily guarded residence of Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray and barely 250 metres from the BKC police station. 

    "We have registered a case under various IPC sections and are searching our database of known criminals," said BKC police senior inspector Chandrakant Bhosle. Fourth chain-snatching in just 15 days in BKC 

Mumbai: Seven minutes into 

    his morning 

    walk on Wednesday, around 5.45am, 

    businessman 

    Rajkumar 

    Agarwal had reached building number C-10 Aaykar Bhawan (income-tax office building) near BKC when two men crept up on him and struck him with iron rods repeatedly on his head before yanking his gold chain. 

    Agarwal told TOI, "I fell on the road after the first blow. I struggled to stand up when the two attackers hit me again. When I asked why they were hitting me, they remained tight-lipped and again rained blows on my face." 

    They even chased Agarwal, who was bleeding profusely, when they briefly seemed to have lost the chain. They fled in the same rickshaw, he said. 

    Agarwal's daughter Ritika, who practises as a doctor in Pune, rushed to Mumbai after the incident. "My father has been jogging in the same area for the last 20 years. Such a brutal incident has shocked us," she said, adding, "My father was lucky. A scan showed that he suffered external injuries on his scalp, but no serious internal injuries. Though he lost around 300-500ml of blood, he managed to reach home and then the hospital.'' The daughter is upset that a few people who were in the vicinity of the attack didn't help her father. 

    Agarwal's neighbour said that this was the fourth chainsnatching incident in the BKC locality in the last 15 days. All the incidents have occurred within a radius of 200-250 metres of the BKC police station. No case has been solved. 

    Senior inspector Bhosle said the incident occurred at one of three stretches identified as a chronic chain-snatching spot. "Anti-chain snatching teams have been deployed at all the three spots to foil such crimes," he said. 

Snatchers target women across city 

    Chain-snatchers robbed four women of gold jewellery worth around Rs 4.6 lakh across the city on Thursday. Laxmi Tangiwala (33) lost her mangalsutra worth Rs 85,000 after a robber targeted her during her morning walk on the Sion-Panvel highway. In other cases, bike-borne snatchers robbed two women of jewellery worth Rs 3.25 lakh in Borivli (E) and Mahim. In yet another case, Vimada Visaraya (60) was attacked and robbed of a chain worth Rs 50,000 around 8am in Mahim. SUBURBAN SHOCKER

. Businessman Rajkumar Agarwal goes for his morning walk 2. Two men creep up on him near the income-tax office and thrash him with rods 3. The chain-snatchers then flee in an autorickshaw (Left) The spot where the incident occurred