11 cars stolen daily in city

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A policeman inspects a stolen car in a file photo —AA

The Mumbai police, which is considered number two in the world after the UK’s Scotland Yard for its detection skills, is still struggling with the menace of chain snatching. But, what’s affecting the police’s performance more is another branch of property offence — motor vehicle thefts.
According to statistics of the last five years obtained from the Mumbai police, on an average, 11 vehicles are stolen in Mumbai everyday. The figure has not seen a dip in the last five years. Mumbai is placed at number three among the metropolises with respect to the uncontrolled offence of vehicle thefts. Delhi tops the list with 40 vehicles stolen everyday, while Bengaluru follows with 12 vehicles stolen daily.
The police believes that it is not an easy task to keep this offence in control, because it not only involves the city police limits, but also state police limits. “Stopping vehicle thefts is very challenging, because in this crime the property is moving. Tracing the stolen moving property with the present security and RTO system we have is not easy,” said an officer from the Mumbai crime branch. “A chain of multiple gangs are involved in stealing a car and in very rare cases does the police reach the last end of the chain,” the officer added.
But, instead of only emphasising on the detection of the crime, precautionary measures taken by citizens, RTOs, vehicle manufacturers can curb this menace more effectively, said an officer from the anti-motor vehicle theft unit.
In the past few years, the Mumbai crime branch has taken the challenge of detection more seriously and has been studying the patterns and modus operandi of vehicle theft racketeers. “We have sanctioned more personnel to the anti-motor vehicle squad and studied the patterns and operating styles of the gangs. This has yielded results and this year, we managed to lessen vehicles thefts by putting many of the thieves behind bars,” said Niket Kaushik, additional commissioner of police (crime).
This year motor vehicle thefts were the only property offence that saw a decrease, Mr Kaushik added.