Car thefts are rising at an alarming rate in the Mumbai city, and Police officials are in the hallucination of cracking the theft cases as soon as possible. But looking at the present scenario, it seems the car thefts have now became modernized and our officials need more techniques to outdo them. However, we don’t dispraise the efforts of Mumbai Police, but this time we had brought you a list of cars that are most stolen from the city due to various reasons and aesthetical benefits over the others. By providing the list, our motive is clear, not to discourage you for buying those particular model cars, but it is for the reason, if you own them then start keeping an eagle eye on it, and also load it with the best security equipments available in the market.
The Story:
As per to an RTI query filed by Mumbai’s daily tabloid MiD DAY, it is been revealed the four-wheelers (specifically the SUVs) like Tavera, Scorpio, Bolero and Innova top the list of the most popular vehicles preferred among the city’s car thieves. The stolen vehicles are then transferred to various parts of country; and before it reaches the last owner it passes through the hands of eight to ten gangs to evade the chances of getting caught, who brief them with various modifications. As per the specific numbers, more than 3000 cars are stolen from the country’s financial capital, which are then transferred to states like Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Punjab and Andhra Pradesh. And as per the sources, the stolen cars are being sold for as mere as Rs 50,000 – 70,000 to the last person in the chain depending upon his needs. He then uses those vehicles in the whine of rural areas, where not most of the raids/police checks aren’t conducted, or if he is turned out to be a smart Alex, then he refurbishes the whole car and prepares all new papers with the new chassis numbers tallying it against the other vehicle of same model which are not stolen. In the recent time, a different sort of case had also surfaced where it was abreacted, the owners whose cars were stolen, approaches these car thieves and get the vehicle of that same year model for an extremely low price, but then they refurbishes the chassis and engine number to the one which they hold the paper of.
The reason cited behind this is, when the despaired owners get their stolen car back then a bunch of government’s official procedure awaits to be cleared, and also the amount of money to be paid in the pockets of fat corrupt officials who sit in between such processes. In the former case, owners get their vehicle back as per the paperwork without much hassle, but underneath the skin it is the stolen car which is refurbished on the engine, chassis and others denominations to the number of the paper which they had (of stolen car). It can also be noted, the number of car thefts have soared during the past five-six years.
The Backstage:
It is very much unlikely the Mumbai Police are sitting hand-tied with the cases pertaining to car thefts. To their best, they had formed a Motor Vehicle Theft (MVT) department consisting of 30 police personnel, which works full-time to trace the stolen cars of city. The latest result found out on this note is, most of the car thefts from city had a connection with gangs in Pratapgarh, UP. “A gang based in Pratapgarh, UP, is the most active in stealing vehicles from the city. The gang members who have mastered the art of making duplicate keys work as taxi drivers in the day and keep a watch on vehicles parked in isolated areas,” said Assistant Sub-Inspector Sadanand Kokitkar from the MVT dept, adding, “The car thieves sell each of these vehicles for anything between Rs 50,000 to 70,000 based on the requirement of the buyers.” Hopefully, all these aforementioned accounts of thefts is been revealed when the police officials nabbed a gang member Kurshid Ahmed alias Nisar in 2010. As per the information available with the police, Ahmed had taken three houses on lease in the slums of Vashi and Mankhurd. “A detailed interrogation of these thieves has revealed that the gang moves around with only a chaddi (trousers), banyan (vest), towel and tooth brush with them. They rent out small hutments in slum pockets across the city, and keep shifting their locations to avoid getting traced,” Kokitkar added. “When we raided the house, there were no other belongings apart from his shorts, banyan, towel and tooth brush. Ahmed, a native of Pratapgarh, during questioning revealed that he was a BEST employee and had quit the job to make a quick buck by stealing vehicles. He was involved in more than 50 cases in Mumbai and its outskirts,” said Kokitkar.
The others names that came up during the investigations are Ayub Ali Mansoor Shaikh alias Guddu, a mechanic, involved in 40 cases and Muqeem alias Mumtaz Khan, who is involved in more than 50 cases. Irshan alias Munna is involved in 20 cases in Pune and Mumbai, while Afsar Ahmed alias Loha, is involved in 60 cases.
The most common factor in between all the members is they work as driver or mechanic during the day, and steals car at night.
An Overview:
Looking at the graph, it can be witnessed, Chevrolet Tavera is the list-topper, where Mahindra Scorpio and Toyota Innova follow it on second and third position respectively. Hence, the motive of the gangs remain clear, they steal those vehicles which can be utilized for various other purposes in the outskirts, for example like people carrier and else. It came surprising the cars like Premier Padmini and Maruti Esteem are also making their way to the list. We wish the thieves wouldn’t be making huge bucks on them, because they too are available for a very least price tag in the pre-owned market, but they pose a lucrative option for some pre-owned spare parts dealers would be selling it by breaking down in pieces due to the lack of availability of spares for those models.
Hope so, there may be more factors surrounding the car thefts in the city, which may sooner or later will come to light. Till now, it’s enough for us to digest that a number of cars/bike/three-wheelers are still meant to be recovered from the thieves, and Police Officials need to be harsh on them who sweeps away the bounty of hard working Indians, who buys it for a sort of adding comfort to the life after going through the struggle for a number of years.
