Cops crack curious case of missing vehicles from city

Recover over 200 vehicles that were sold by a gang at throwaway prices in villages along the Tamil Nadu-Karnataka border

Cops crack curious case of missing vehicles from city

Recover over 200 vehicles that were sold by a gang at throwaway prices in villages along the Tamil Nadu-Karnataka border

Theu00a0police yesterday recovered more than 200 stolen vehicles from a few towns along Tamil Nadu-Karnataka border, busting a racket notorious for stealing vehicles from the city and selling them off at throwaway prices in the rural areas.

Dirt cheap: The thieves had sold the stolen vehicles to the rural folku00a0
for as low as Rs 5,000. Representation pic

The police, however, withheld the names of the towns as, they said, it could affect further investigations into the case. After the police got some credible information about the stolen vehicles from a few petty thieves, who were arrested last week in the city, they launched a special drive to trace the booty.

"During interrogation we got to know that the thieves had sold the stolen vehicles to the rural folku00a0 for as low as Rs 5,000. In some cases, the buyers were promised that all the documents of the vehicle would be given to them. But after doing away with the vehicles, the thieves fled the spot," said Sunil Kumar, Addl CP (law and order).

"The thieves sold many vehicles even in the rural towns around Tamil Nadu. We contacted our counterparts there and recovered the vehicles," added Kumar.

Once people in small towns and villages, where the vehicles were sold, got a whiff of the drive, they started disposing of the vehicles in rather unique ways. "There have been instances where the buyers threw the bikes, bought from these thieves, into wells.

While some dug a ditch and buried the vehicles, others abandoned the vehicles on the outskirts of their respective towns," Kumar said. The police have now started awareness programmes in all the rural towns adjoining the city discourage people from buying stolen vehicles.