: The police may have initiated several measures to curb incidents of snatching and hooliganism on central Delhi’s Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg, but they have failed to instil fear in the hearts of criminals.
Some recent incidents indicate that culprits have just changed their hunting spots, some of which are barely metres away from the police barricades that were set up in the area following a spate of such crimes last month.
The most recent of these daring snatching incidents occurred on Thursday when a journalist with The Hindu was returning home after work around 8.30 p.m.
Two motorcycle-borne men swooped down on his mobile phone and escaped in a jiffy, the action taking place near Pearey Lal Bhawan, hardly a stone’s throw from the Delhi Police Headquarters.
“The snatchers did not care to even hide their identities with helmets. Shockingly, they rode against the traffic to escape from the spot,” said Kallol Bhattacherjee, the victim.
He immediately drew the attention of the policemen deployed nearby, but it was too late by then. When he visited the IP Estate police station to get a case registered, he met two other victims whose mobile phones had been snatched near the ITO junction on the same day.
Other cases
This was not a lone incident involving journalists on their own turf. Last month, three incidents of snatching involving journalists took place on three consecutive days. Earlier this year, a policewoman and a nurse were among the victims.
The crimes were followed by the suspension of three policemen, and the Delhi Police’s top brass ensured a slew of steps such as increasing manpower on the stretch, deploying motorcycle-borne beat policemen and roping in the Central District’s anti-snatching unit to identify the criminals.
Reacting to the recent incidents, Parmaditya, DCP (Central), claimed that his personnel had managed to clamp down on these crimes. “We have been putting in all our efforts. We will catch the culprits,” said Mr. Parmaditya.
According to sources, the accused live in the trans-Yamuna area, and visit central Delhi only to commit these crimes.
