While the overall crime rate -- and even number of fatal accidents -- is showing a downward trend this year, the police have failed to check chain snatchers targeting lone women walking down the roads. This was admitted to by Hyderabad Police Commissioner A.K. Khan recently.
It was a coincidence that three days after his candid acknowledgment snatchers struck at five places on a single day in the adjacent Cyberabad Commissionerate area. Two women were robbed within 30 minutes in the morning at K.P.H.B. Colony, while three more were targeted by snatchers in L.B. Nagar area in the afternoon. Notwithstanding claims of the police that the incidence of crime was dipping, instances of snatching – especially targeting lone women -- are rising alarmingly both in Hyderabad and Cyberabad. The snatchings have not suddenly shot up. What started as stray incidents of bike-riding youngsters stalking lone women and speeding away after grabbing their chains in early 2000, have become daily occurrences in and around the State capital. When nearly 40 chain snatchings were reported within two months in entire Hyderabad in 2001, some women's organisations took out rallies protesting that women in the State capital had no protection even to walk on the road. Ten years later, chain snatchings have become the rule rather than an exception. Police are coming out with advisories for women how to be cautious about snatchers.
Mr. Khan maintained that the police could not concentrate on prevention of crime due to the pro-Telangana agitation, recent strike by government employees, frequent unrest on Osmania University campus and related issues. However, barring slight changes in frequency, snatchings continue to be reported in city for past few years. Police are catching offenders in burglaries, robberies and dacoities after analysing the modus operandi. Database of gangs resorting to particular crimes using a specific mode helps investigators zero in on the accused. “In snatchings, we don't have such clues. Moreover, tracking youngsters committing snatchings for the first time is tough as we don't have their past records,” maintain investigators.
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How is it that a single snatcher is striking twice, thrice or sometimes five times within an hour and still managing to evade police? Apparently the coordination and communication between field officers of the two commissionerates is poor. Sometimes, the KPHB police are unaware of the snatchings reported in L.B. Nagar though both are part of Cyberabad Commissionerate. There is an average time gap of 15 minutes to 30 minutes between an instance of snatching and the victim approaching the police station. This is turning advantageous for the offender because even five minutes is adequate for a bike rider to disappear into any corner of the city's concrete jungle.