Hiding in plain sight: Over 1,000 fugitives nabbed by Delhi Police in 3 months

The crackdown against proclaimed offenders (POs) or fugitives began in March . And since then -- 310 POs were arrested in March, 407 in April and 356 until May 27. The number of such people arrested in February was less than 150, the data shows, indicating the spurt after the targeted action.

For almost 22 years, the villagers of Shripalpur in Patna, Bihar, and the state police believed Kishun Pandit (60), a top local Naxal commander, was dead. Sometime in early 1998, his family held a condolence meeting which further established that the former rebel who was last heard about for his involvement in the murder of a police officer in Punpun, Bihar, died in a train accident.

The arrests were made from across the country in such states as Mumbai, Kolkata and from small towns in Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh. (Representative photo/Shutterstock)

On April 7, a Delhi Police team arrested a person on the outskirts of Faridabad. Though locals knew him to be Sulender Pandit, an ice cream seller, the police officers revealed that he actually was Kishun Pandit who was living for all these years under a false identity.

In 1996, Kishun and around 200 other members of his Naxal group had surrounded a police team in Punpun, Bihar and attacked them with guns, sickles and axe. Kishun had also robbed a rifle and 40 bullets, after killing a police officer. While other accused persons were arrested, Kishun had fled Bihar.

The crackdown against proclaimed offenders (POs) or fugitives began in March. (HT Illustration)

Pandit was among 1,073 proclaimed offenders who were arrested by the Delhi Police in the past three months, according to police data. Many of these were living under false identities with even their close neighbours not knowing about their criminal past.

The crackdown against proclaimed offenders (POs) or fugitives began in March . And since then -- 310 POs were arrested in March, 407 in April and 356 until May 27. The number of such people arrested in February was less than 150, the data shows, indicating the spurt after the targeted action.

Among those arrested there was a convicted Delhi-based drug dealer, who jumped parole, posed as a Sikh and even got a driver’s licence made from Punjab; a security guard accused of murder 21 years ago, who lived in five cities for two decades; an alleged dacoit who changed his identity and turned a tea seller and a middle aged man whose decade old crime wasn’t known to even his wife. The arrests were made from across the country in such states as Mumbai, Kolkata and from small towns in Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh.

HT spoke to police officers involved in these operations to see how they managed to evade the law for several years.

Cabbie who evaded law for 21 years

On March 10, police arrested former security guard, Raj Kumar (21), who was wanted for 21 years for a murder in Delhi’s Okhla. When police caught him from a house in Kolkata, he had a new name -- Rakesh Kumar, a new profession, cab driver.

“After fleeing Delhi, he worked for an engineer in Bengaluru in 2008-09. The engineer, when contacted, said that he had no idea about Kumar’s past. To him, he was Rakesh, a driver. Raj worked with the engineer for almost two years and must have spent hundreds of hours in the same vehicle, but the engineer never saw Raj speak on the phone. The engineer always found that unusual. Raj always told his employer that his family lived in a village in Bihar’s Samastipur where there was no cell phone connection,” said an officer.

The Bengaluru engineer, the fellow taxi drivers in Kolkata, or his house owner -- none of them were aware of Raj’s past. No one knew that Raj -- the middle-aged taxi driver was once a security guard; also, the union vice president of workers in a security company. It was during a on March 12, 2001, that Raj murdered the union president of the security company in Okhla and fled Delhi.

Police officers, who have been part of search teams, said, a common thread binds the life of such characters -- they change names, jobs, live in different cities, change appearances, and lie about their past to even their family members and are careful not to connect with people from their past.

Many of them also took help from cons to manage fake identity papers.

Cheat who acquired a new look

Between October 2021 and March 2022, Delhi Police teams visited Mumbai and Nashik at least four times to catch Piyush Tiwari -- declared a proclaimed offender 2016. Police found his involvement in at least 35 cases of cheating homebuyers in Delhi, Uttar Pradesh and Punjab and pegged the loss he caused to the investors at ₹1000 crore.

But each time, the police teams returned empty handed. It seemed he has disappeared in air. Nobody knew about his whereabouts. noboby identified him from his photographs.

On March 20, 2022, when police finally arrested him from Nashik, they realised why they had failed to catch him.

Tiwari(42) had changed his name to Puneet Bhardwaj. grown a beard, dye it white, kept his hair long, and wore only long kurtas. In Nashik, he was working as an onion trader.

“Tiwari was living a new life. We learnt that he anonymously invested in a popular food chain there. Sometime in 2019, he fled Noida where he lived in the upmarket Omaxe Forest Spa, of Sector 93B Noida,” said Sagar Singh Kalsi, deputy commissioner of police (north).

An investigation officer said when he questioned Tiwari, how he had managed to avoid arrest, Tiwari purportedly said that he left Delhi before the pandemic. “Even during the pandemic, when thousands of people were dying of the infection, I did not contact my wife ( who has also been jailed in the cheating case).”

Drug dealer who shunned his gang

Ishwar Singh (55), an alleged drug dealer, was declared a fugitive in March 2021, when he did not surrender after being released on a special parole that was allowed to decongest Tihar Jail at the peak of Covid-19 waves in 2020 and 2021.

For one and half years, the police looked for him but to no avail. Nobody had a clue about Singh’s whereabouts. The police informers had no tips to share. Even his associates in the Dharamveer Palla gang had little information about him.

When Singh was finally arrested on March 11, he had a flowing beard and wore a turban like a Sikh, and changed his name to Happy Singh. He also got a driving licence under the fake name from Ludhiana, the investigators said Gaurav Sharma, then DCP of the south-west district.

Singh, who was involved with smuggling of marijuana, had also gone solo in his operations. “Earlier, he used to smuggle narcotics in trucks bringing coconuts from the southern states. After jumping parole, Singh took a cab, built a concealed box in the vehicle’s body and started smuggling drugs from Odisha.To his fellow cab drivers, he was Dabu,” an investigator said asking not to be named.

Police expert Rajender Singh, who retired as an assistant commissioner of police, and has been part of many significant cases such as the 2012 Delhi gang rape said, fugitives are of three types.

“Cons change names, modus operandi but continue to dupe people. The second are those who commit heinous crimes such as murder and cannot risk being arrested. The third are people who may commit minor crimes but evade arrest because they fear life in prison. To ensure that people do not evade arrest and get away from crime, there should be a law to seize their property and make them liable if they run away.”

On the lives of such people who manage to avoid arrest for years, Singh said,” Policing works on what we call contact theory. We are able to arrest criminals only when they touch (get in touch with) their contact. A criminal who disassociates himself or herself with their family and accomplices will successfully remain in hiding. Even the best investigators won’t find them. But it is price, not everyone can afford to pay. Only a few manage do erase their past, shun their old life and live a different one. But what life is that?”