Two copies of Holy Qur’an dating back to the Mughal era and inscribed in gold letters were recovered by the Crime Branch of Delhi Police after the arrest of three persons from Hazrat Nizamuddin area in the capital. The police said the Crime Branch’s Special Operation Squad (SOS) received a tip-off that some persons were trying to sell the religious books which come under the category of rarest of rare. The police arrested Gurdeep Singh (48) Sanjay Nathani (41) and Prasanjit Biswas (33). The accused were booked under section 411 (receiving stolen property and other sections of the Antiquity and Art Treasures Act).
According to a report, the current value of these copies of the Holy Qur’an is estimated over to be over Rs. 100 crore, oblivious of the value of the copies. The accused were trying to sell it for Rs. 3.5 crore. The police recovered a laminated leather bound “Holy Quran” in Arabic, embedded with golden metallic leaves on each face of the book. The copies of Holy Qur’an are so old and rare that their pages have turned brittle. However, ASI officials said the copies of the Holy Quran belong to the Shahjahan’s period.