Hyderabad : Hyderabad police have arrested a retired Army Havildar for stealing firearms and nearly 1,900 rounds of ammunition from the Kote and Magazine rooms of the 20 Battalion. Mallesh, who joined the Army in 2010 and retired on June 30, 2026, carried out the theft on the intervening night of August 30 and 31. Police said his preliminary motive was disgruntlement over his early retirement.
He then placed the magazine bag in a white Brezza car that he owns. From there, he drove to a temple where he had left the stolen firearms and ammunition, loaded the entire cache into the car and began his journey towards Achampet. Police said Mallesh used the Outer Ring Road, Sagar Ring Road and Bangalore Gate Road, while avoiding the Srisailam Road to evade toll gates.
According to DGP Anand, after being removed from the job, Mallesh had been taking passengers in his car to earn a livelihood. He picked up four people near the Sagar Ring Road taxi point, dropped them at Devarakonda and took payment from them. He then picked up two more passengers at Dindi, collected payment from them and dropped them further ahead.
“What was lost and caused concern for 10 days, there were issues involved such as where the weapons reached, whether they reached any foreign countries, whether they got into spy network, and terrorist elements. It is a relief to all that the case was detected, without any threat to internal security. The military officers also thanked. They (army) are preparing full-fledged report on why it happened,” Anand said.
He said the police have not found any international connection, espionage and any attempt to sell off the weapons to others. “We have arrested him. We have to verify the links whether he did it alone or anyone was with him. We expected the probe to be over in a few days, we were worried whether it involved any bigger aspects. But, luckily, it indicates that there is no such thing,” the DGP added.
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