Cops say Iranis settled across Thane city — Rashid compound and Srilanka Nagar in Mumbra, Piranipada and Iranipada in Bhiwandi, and Patil Nagar and Irani Vasti in Ambivali — are behind majority of cases



Some of the chain-snatchers arrested

The Thane police have taken up cracking down on the increasing incidences of chain-snatching in the city on a war footing. After preparing a list of 20 of the most active ones, all of whom are part of an organised crime syndicate, officers claimed that they have so far arrested nine of them and hunt is on for the rest. From 2014, the Thane police started making extra effort to curb the menace. In 2014, 976 cases were reported in the commissionerate, which came down to 843 in 2015 and 362 in 2016.

The one running the show

Sources said the credit goes to Thane police commissioner Parambir Singh, who took charge in March 2015. "After I joined, I had decided that my first priority would be safety of women, and the rising number of chain-snatching incidents was making them insecure. So, I held regular meetings and formed special units and deployed officers to specifically target chainsnatchers across the city," he said.

"From seeing nearly 100 cases a month, it's now come down to 20-25 cases. We want to bring the number of cases to zero and we will get there." Singh added that teamwork and hardworking officers, who followed up on every case, helped them nail the culprits.

Family business

The police said Iranis settled across Thane city — Rashid compound and Srilanka Nagar in Mumbra, Piranipada and Iranipada in Bhiwandi, and Patil Nagar and Irani Vasti in Ambivali — are the ones behind a majority of the cases.

"Elders of all these families are into this, with their children either being neglected or being trained in this very art from an early age. The women of the families are given the job of selecting the targets and later selling the booty. The women are also sent to courts to handle the cases, while even the senior citizens in the families dupe people outside banks," said a Thane crime branch officer.

Behind the scenes

Singh took meetings with crime branch sleuths and local deputy commissioners of police, and accordingly formed squads for the five zones in Thane commissionerate and two special squads comprising crime branch sleuths for Thane and Kalyan. The teams started collecting records of chainsnatchers and scanning footage from CCTVs to zero in on the habitual offenders.

"We found out that a woman from the family would be given the task of searching for a target, after which the men would come on bikes and snatch the chain and hand it over to the woman to sell. After arresting some of the accused, we found out that it's an organised crime syndicate that has disturbed the city," said deputy commissioner of police (Thane crime branch) Parag Manare.

"As per the information gathered against the accused, we have even booked some of them under the stringent MCOCA (Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act, 1999)."

976

Number of cases in 2014

362

Number of cases in 2016