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Pimpri police crack inter-state illegal trade of stolen cars, recover 12 vehicles
Accused would regularly travel to Delhi by air and drive back in stolen cars. These cars were later sold to interested buyers, according to the police.
The Pimpri police on Tuesday said that it have cracked 12 vehicle theft cases with the arrest of a garage owner, a history-sheeter, on January 26.
The arrested has been identified as Chanpreet Harvindarpal Singh, 43, a resident of SB Patil road, Ravet. He was remanded to police custody for 13 days before being remanded to judicial custody by a local court. Singh would regularly travel to Delhi by air and drive back in stolen cars. These cars were later sold to interested buyers, according to the police.
The police recovered 12 such cars sold by Singh. The cars were retrieved from buyers in Pune, Navi Mumbai, Nagpur, Satara, Ahmednagar, Pimpri-Chinchwad and Ale Phata regions of Maharashtra and Goa. Along with the garage in Ravet, Singh also has a godown in Kondhwa. At the Kondhwa godown, the police found 13 engines of damaged cars and two engines of stolen cars. The total recovery is estimated to be worth Rs 2,19,00,000, according to senior police inspector Uttam Tangde of Unit 1 crime branch.
The police found that Singh used to buy damaged cars from insurance companies and steal cars with the same make from other states, including Delhi, Punjab and Haryana. The parts of the stolen car were then replaced by the damaged car parts and sold in various parts of Maharashtra, said police.
Singh came under police radar after hawaldar Sachin More and assistant police inspector Ganesh Patil received information that a garage in Ganeshnagar, Ravet has stolen goods. The tip-off was received on January 24 and after two days of observation, Singh was arrested on January 26, according PI Tangde.
Tangde said that Singh was arrested from his garage and two stolen vehicles —Toyota Innova and Maruti Swift — were found. While the registration number on Innova was from Maharashtra, the chassis number revealed that it was from Punjab. Swift, on the other hand, carried fake registration number.
A case was registered under Sections 379, 411, 413, 420, 465, 467, 468, 471, 483, 486, 487 and 34 of Indian Penal Code at Dehuroad police station against Singh. The police also found 10 other cases registered against him in the past at different police stations.
