Armed robberies keep cops on their toes

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September 28: Group of five or six armed men loot passengers on Kalka-Delhi Himalayan Queen Express in Narela,Outer Delhi.

August 31: Six armed men hold Delhi Police Inspector Sanjeev Verma and his family hostage in their house at Mansarovar Park,Northeast Delhi,during a birthday party. Cash and valuables worth Rs 1.5 lakh looted at gunpoint.

August 17: Armed robbers strike Chandra Kant Dadwal’s house in Vivek Vihar,East Delhi,and loot Rs 7 lakh. The family was celebrating a birthday and everybody at the party was held hostage.

These are some of the recent instances of brazen armed robberies in which assailants took family members hostage. Besides creating a fear psychosis,the incidents have put the police on their toes.

What’s worse from the investigation point of view,says a senior officer,the police are yet to work out whether these seemingly isolated incidents are linked. For,it has been seen previously that same gangs are involved in similar strikes and break-ins.

Officials in various specialised units — like the Crime Branch,Special Cell and Special Staffs of Delhi Police’s various districts — are now working to uncover whether any organised gang is responsible for these incidents.

The senior officer says these “traditional crimes” were reported fairly widely till the 1990s,but most such gangs were either eliminated or they fled from the Capital.

The question is: are those criminals back as the city police stretch themselves to provide security in the run-up to next October’s Commonwealth Games?

‘Organised gangs always active in Delhi,NCR’
The police,though,deny it officially. According to an officer,these gangs are mostly from neighbouring states of Uttar Pradesh and Haryana and flee after striking at households in Delhi. The officer says such gangs always attack in numbers,and are always armed.

“Most of them belong to tribes like Banwaria,Pardi and Sansi,” the officer says. These tribes are known to be involved in armed robberies. Last year,the officer says,a Sansi gang robbed several bank vans across Delhi.

The police are now probing whether the recent crimes were the handiwork of gangs from these tribes,the officer says.

Another officer says a “kachccha baniyan gang” — their members typically go around in undergarments during organised strikes — was also active in UP and Delhi till sometime back,and the police are trying to know whether any gang member had links in the recent crimes. The officer says these criminals take shelter in rural parts of different cities of UP — Meerut,Bulandshahr,Hapur,Aligarh,Muzaffarnagar,Fatehgarh,Kanpur and Agra among others — and strike in Delhi,too.

What police are doing?
A senior officer says records of criminals who were arrested in the last few years have been checked. What’s significant,the officer says,is the assailants seem to have studied the houses where they struck.

“Till somebody is arrested in East Delhi incident (where at least two birthday parties were targetted in August),we cannot say whether old hands are involved,” the officer says. “Since they were targeting birthday parties,it means the assailants had information about the family and knew of the function in advance.

“They also knew roughly when the guests would arrive and leave.”

The official says the police are also educating people about strangers and precautions to be taken when only female family members are at home. The police are also drawing up a list of fresh criminals who have been arrested once or twice for snatching or petty crimes and are keeping an eye on them.

1,400 out of 1,500 persons arrested till July this year were involved in crime for first time
372 robberies reported till September-end,against 404 last year
(Figures from Delhi Police)