Daijiworld Media Network - Bangalore (SP)
Bangalore, Feb 17: The city policemen accidentally came across a major gang of car thieves which was able to steal over 7,000 cars, without giving an inkling of their covertive operations to either the banks which hired them, owners of the vehicles from whom they snatched the vehicles away or the policemen. Police commissioner Shankar Bidari gave details of the modus operandi of the gang at a press conference held here on Monday February 16.
The gang was in operation since about four years, and the city police came to know of its existence after the Andhra Pradesh policemen contacted them with regard to a case of cheating. Bidari informed that the policemen took 14 persons into custody in this connection on Monday. They also recovered two pistols, some lethal weapons, nine live bullets and 12 cars, totally valued at about Rs 60 lac from them. The arrested have been identified as Raviraj (37) from Yelahanka, Lakshman (33) from Sunkadakatte, Girish (27) from Yelahanka, Nagaraj from Doddaballapur, Ramesh (25) from Bommanahalli, Mohan (28) from Mururayanagar, Azhar (51) from Wilson Garden, Fazil (30) from B G Road, Alim Shaff from Infantry Road, Yesu (3) from Yelahanka New Town, Vasu (24) from Marutinagar, Harish (23) from Srinivaspura, Murugan (33) from Hegdenagar and Ravikumar (38) from Sunkadakatte. He also claimed that the gang members were involved with more than 50 cases relating to murder, dacoity etc., and that the illegal weapons they used came from Bihar, UP etc.
The thieves used to apply for the posts of recovery agents from reputed banks. They gave temporary addresses and vacated the houses soon after the addresses were verified and they received appointment letters. They would threaten the loan defaulters and seize their vehicles by wielding lethal weapons. They would then remove the number plates and chassis of the vehicles and fix them to damaged cars. They used to show the damaged cars to bank officials and urge them to write off loans, claiming that the cars would not fetch any value. In some cases, they informed the banks that some rowdies had the custody over the cars and hence recovery of cars was impossible. Then fake documents were used to sell the seized cars. They kept a few vehicles with them to show to the bank officials.
It is learnt, that majority of the cars they took away in this fashion, were financed by Citi Bank. The gangs had different groups that would oversee certain areas of their operations.
The commissioner has requested the banks to appoint recovery agents only after police verification, as appointing persons of dubious integrity might land the banks in trouble later.