India, June 4 -- A thief who shimmied up pipes on buildings near railway tracks and broke into homes to steal has been arrested, revealing an impressive booty. The man, a native of Bihar who lived in a rented flat in Malwani in Malad, had used the proceeds of crime to book a flat in Malad, buy a plot of land in Bihar, and collect a small pile of gold in his flat.

Malad police said Ranjitkumar Upendrakumar Singh, 44, used an ingenious array of disguises to escape detection. He either dressed as a woman, an early morning jogger or an office-goer so that he would melt into the crowd in case police scanned CCTV footage to identify him.

Police have recovered Rs.13 lakh from Singh's bank account, and melted gold and silver worth Rs.37 lakh fr...