Pramesh Jain
Contrary to the lock down which forced people to stay at homes,various forms of thefts and vehicle lifting top the city crime list in the first half of the year till July 21 this year .
The statistics from the City Crime Record Bureau shows that as many as 777 house break thefts of all forms have been reported while the police managed to detect only 251.The remaining 526 cases are yet to be detected and proving a major headache for the police.
Similarly as many as 2098 vehicle theft cases were reported in and around the city but the police managed to detect only 346 cases while the remaining 1752 vehicles are yet to be traced.
This is because the stolen vehicles are taken out of the city within one hour and sold to the people after tampering the chassis numbers.
However,the accused dismantled old vehicles part by part and sold them in junk yards,which is why it is very difficult to track the stolen vehicles , the police said .
The recovery and detection rates reflect the efficiency of city police and the performance are rated accordingly.
Though the city police have good investigative skills and basic policing techniques in maintaining law and order and containing heinous crimes,they lag behind in acting on the property related offences.
Many police officials are of the opinion that since last year the main focus of the police is shifted to enforcing covid guidelines from investigations and law and order maintenance.
According to the statistics as many as 1146 cheating cases reported out of which only 372 detected while the remaining 774 cases are yet to be cracked.The police seem to have fared well in handling other cases.
According to the statistics a total of 82 murders reported in the seven months this year out of which the police detected 80 of them.
Out of 22 dacoity 21 cases have been detected while out of 87 chain snatching cases reported the police cracked 64 cases while the remaining 23 are under investigation.
There are 2481 cases registered under NDPS out of which the police detected 1893 cases .
Out of 219 robbery cases police detected 162 cases while 413 cases of kidnap and missing cases a good number of 244 cases have been detected while the rest of 169 cases are still under investigation.
While handling crime against women the city police is not up to the mark.Out of 304 cases of sexual harassment the city police detected 189 cases while the remaining 115 remain unsolved.
However out of 59 rape cases registered this year the police cracked 53 cases.
A total 207 cases of assault on women and dowry harassment and domestic violence cases reported out of which 178 cases have been detected.
As many as 185 posco cases were reported till July this year out of which the police detected 157 cases.
Admitting that the law and order and crime detections has taken a back seat,a senior police officer attributed this to a change in priority during the lockdown period .
The presence of police in the form of patrolling and basic policing with local criminal intelligence systems are best to contain crime and maintain law and order
Due to many factors in the last few months this has been affected badly and we are reviving to put this in place,another police officer added.
In a recent crime review meeting city police commissioner,Kamal Pant directed the Hoysala patrolling police to step up vigil and directed the jurisdictional police officers not to use patrolling vehicles for other purposes.
