The Hyderabad police got specific information that Faheem, along with an associate, had ventured out to take away cash from Big C showroom in Madhapur on Thursday.

In a daring daylight operation on Thursday, the city police nabbed two armed persons even as one of them fired at close range at them in the upmarket Jubilee Hills.

The policemen rounding up the duo escaped from the gunshot but the bullet hit a Metro Rail worker, sitting in a four-wheeler passing by, on his collar bone.

He was rushed to a private hospital and is recovering.

Task Force (TF), a wing working directly under the City Police Commissioner, recently got inputs from informants that a gang was conspiring to commit robberies at gunpoint. Mirza Abdullah Baig alias Faheem of Gulbarga of Karnataka, who was earlier caught by TF sleuths, was the prime suspect.

They got specific information that Faheem, along with an associate, had ventured out to take away cash from Big C showroom in Madhapur on Thursday.

A 10-member TF West team, led by Inspector L. Raja Venkat Reddy, began their operation on five bikes.

They spotted Faheem riding a bike while another person, later identified as his accomplice Qader of Gulbarga, sat pillion.

“Since they were moving, we didn’t rush to intercept as they could have given us the slip,” said the police later. TF personnel were biding their time when Faheem had to stop at the traffic signal point on Road No. 36 of Jubilee Hills near the Neeru’s showroom. As he halted, policemen stalking him jumped off their vehicles and rounded up the duo. They first kicked Faheem’s bike, throwing Qader off it. Alerted by the approaching police, Faheem too hopped down, whipped out his country-made pistol and fired at Inspector Venkat Reddy blindly. Mr. Reddy ducked and escaped the gunshot while others caught hold of Qader.

The shooter too was caught after a chase. The TF sleuths had short firearms with them but didn’t return fire.