Spate of chain snatchings gives tough time for police in suburbs

Termed as the ‘easiest crime’ in police parlance, chain snatching continues to be the most preferred mode of making easy money and the offenders include degree holders and youth from  well-to-do  families. “Youth use stolen bikes and helmets while attempting to snatch chains. If they stop with one offence or two, it is extremely difficult to trace them. 

Gold can be disposed of easily and that helps the youth make money easily,” a senior police official told DTNext. The  cases continue  to  happen despite the  efforts to curb them. The city police  have a beat patrol system as part of the community policing programme. 

There are 403 bike patrol teams in the 135 police stations under Greater Chennai Police Commissionerate. Each police station has divided their jurisdiction into three sectors and each sector has three units on  patrol working in three shifts. 

Each of these units cover 20 points in their respective sectors and all three units  total up to 60 points in each sector. Police also have a registry where the team members sign to acknowledge their presence in the area.

“Despite having all these patrolling mechanisms in place, snatching continue to occur. Police had also issued around one lakh copies of an advisory, where the public had been told what to do and what not to do to avert such crimes,” another police official added. 

However, Chennai city police sources said  the number of cases   has come down in 2015 compared to the cases reported in 2014. “We had registered 411 cases in 2014 and the number has come down to 229 this year. We have arrested 275 accused and detained 125 of them under the Goondas Act,” a senior police officer l said. Police had also recovered 85 sovereigns of gold jewellery from the accused this year.