‘They’ve been snapped, they’ll be caught’

The crime is there for all to see - splashed in vivid colours across the front page of a city daily. But there is no official complaint.

And without it, police are groping in the dark. But they are confident that they would be able to nab the guilty on the basis of the tell-tale photographs.

“The face of one of the molestors can be clearly seen in the photos. We hope it would be enough to track him down,” joint commissioner of police (law and order) KL Prasad said on Wednesday.

Police have also taken statements of the two press photographers, who had snapped those 15 minutes of madness on Juhu Tara Road in the wee hours of New Year’s Day. “We have eyewitnesses who would be able to recognise the gropers,” Prasad said.

If the cops already have a plan in place to track down the offenders, Prasad kept it under wraps. “I won’t be able to reveal how we will investigate the case,” he told reporters. All police stations across the city have been told to be on the lookout for the offenders, he added.

Police have registered a case under sections of the Indian Penal Code and Bombay Police Act for rioting, unlawful assembly, criminal intimidation, outraging modesty of woman, causing criminal breach or trust and molestation, etc. against the uniden-tified miscreants.