Daijiworld Media Network - Puttur (SP)

Puttur, May 22: Week end thefts had become a common occurrence in the city since the last one year. During this period, families which had left for outstations on week ends to attend functions or other assignments, found that their houses had been burgled promptly. Cash and valuables running into several lacs of rupees were lost. People were becoming impatient over the inability of police department to stop these thefts.

There is good news at last. Town police inspector here, Mahesh Prasad, led a team of policemen to Tenkila Shivanagara here on Friday May 20 and arrested a person named Tangaraju (64), who the police claim, was involved with seven of the thefts stated above. On producing him in the court here on Saturday, Tangaraju was remanded to eight days police custody.

Tangaraju, the policemen claim, was involved with thefts in the houses of Dr Suresh Putturaya residing in the town, Krishna Bhat, advocate, Diwakar Nidvannaya, Kudgi Prabhakar Shenoy, Mudrumpady Dr Subrahmanya Bhat, Chandrashekhar Bhat, and advocate, K R Acharya. He usually broke open rear doors of houses and escape after committing theft.

Silver items worth Rs 25,000 which were stolen from the house of K R Acharya were recovered from Tangaraju. These items had been hidden by him in Tenkila area. He was nabbed when he came back there to retrieve them.

Tangaraju, native of Kanhangad in Kasargod district, faces several cases of theft at Madikeri, Kushalnagar, Kundapur, Udupi, and several police stations in Kerala. Tangaraju, who began to steal at the age of 16, is currently facing over 30 cases, it is learnt. He was once caught in 2011 at Udupi, during which period policemen came to know about 28 cases of thefts he was involved with. He is so deft that he was never caught till he age of 58 since he began stealing.

The policemen say Tangaraju does no possess cellphone, and always took care to erase his finger prints before leaving. He normally roamed around during the day and identified houses which were found locked for theft. After confirming that there is no dog, he jumps over the compound wall at night, wait till midnight, and after making sure that families would not return, began to break open the door, commit thefts, and waited till morning. He usually hid the things he stole after taking some of them, and came back later to take the remaining items back.

He had chosen Saturdays for his thefts in the town. He faithfully shared a part of the booty with the Lord, by dropping off cash into donation boxes of temples. He also was known as a patron of programmes organized by voluntary organizations, by donating for them liberally. He had hired a permanent room in a lodge at Mangaluru where he paid a daily rent of Rs 600. His family and children, it is gathered, live at Kanhangad.

Mahesh Prasad takes credit for arresting Tangaraju for the second time. In 2011, he had caught Tangaraju when posted as sub-inspector of Kota police station in Udupi district.