BENGALURU: If you had lodged a complaint about your mobile being stolen, it's time to run to your area police station as the Bengaluru Central division police has made a major breakthrough by arresting an inter-state mobile robbery gang.
A special team comprising 45 technical staff have nabbed 10 accused persons and seized 563 mobile phones worth Rs 1.25 crore.
The gang used to erase all the data from the stolen mobiles and sold them in Hyderabad and other cities.
Kijar Pasha (21), a resident of JJ Nagar, Asif Khan alias Asif (36), Afjal alias Mouli (36), Padarayanapura resident Aslam (47), Khaleem (20), Salman (22), Syed Akbar (42), Nawaz Sharif alias Akram (42), Zameer Khan (28) from Hyderabad are those who have been arrested. The police have seized 12 iPhones, 81 Samsung, 57 Vivo, 44 Oppo, 21 Nokia, 17 Sony, 42 Motorola, 22 Lenovo, 22 RedMi, and 23 Honor handsets among other phones.
According to DCP Central Chetan Singh Rathod, there was a spurt in mobile theft cases and robberies in certain areas of the division. The locations of the robbed mobile handsets were traced to Hyderabad. The technical staff worked day and night to track the gang behind this crime, he added.
The accused had used two autos and a bike to commit the crimes. The IMEI numbers of the seized mobiles will be tracked to trace the owners, he said. The accused Kizar Pasha, a cloth merchant, tyre seller Khaleem and auto drivers Nawaz Sharif and Afzal Sharif used to go around the city to attack and rob mobiles from lonely people.
Arid Pasha, Aseef Khan, Aslam and Syed Akbar bought these mobile handsets at throwaway prices. They erased the data by using flash technology and packed them for a sell-off at a higher price.
Ameer Zameer, who was brought from Hyderabad and arrested used to sell the handsets. The accused had attacked people whoever had resisted their attempts to rob mobiles.
Bhaskar Rao, City Police Commissioner said, 79,618 mobile theft cases were lodged with the police till September. The team was headed by DCP Central Chetan Singh Rathod, inspectors Tanveer, Rafeeq and Jagadeesh.
