DNA’s Mumbai correspondent recounts the experience of how a gang of women and children stole her bag at a famous food joint in Kalyaninagar in less than 10 seconds.
On December 31, our friends from Bangalore had just returned to Pune after a darshan at Shirdi and we decided to go to McDonald’s at Kalyaninagar for a quick bite.
It was just 15 minutes after we settled down at a table that a lady came up to me and said that she had seen a little girl picking up my handbag (which was hanging on the chair).
We immediately went to the Ramwadi Police Chowky to lodge a complaint. Havildar Saswade at the police chowky was very helpful in filing the FIR.
“It will be useful to get duplicates of your documents (driver’s licence, PAN card and RC for four-wheeler),” he kept repeating even as he noted ‘missing/lost purse’ (not stolen) before my complaint.
When informed that it was a child who had stolen the bag, he said, “It is very difficult to catch women because we don’t have their photos and other information on them.”
The issue was also complicated since none of us had ‘seen’ the girl stealing the bag.
Not one to give up, I wanted him to take some action so I called up a journalist seeking help. The journalist persuaded him to see the CCTV footage in our presence.
Realising that it was a case of theft, Saswade referred the matter to sub inspector Suresh Gholap, who also promised action and assured us that the CCTV footage would be analysed. But the police did not take any footage from the restaurant.
However, determined to get to the bottom of the matter, we took the CCTV footage from the restaurant.
Seven cameras were installed at various places in the restaurant. While the robbery itself was captured on camera no 7 installed at the exit used by the girl aged between 8 and 10 years, the other footages showed that three women were also involved in the theft.
A fourth woman also looks suspicious in the CCTV grabs.
It was a team operation and the women had marked my bag. They chose a small girl for the job knowing that even if she got caught she would be let off with a warning. The girl walked in full view of the camera, picked up my bag and walked out. The whole act took less than 10 seconds.
Next day I received a call from a housewife in Narayanpeth whose maid had found my bag under the staircase of their residential society.
Before I went to pick it up I visited the chowky to ask the police if they wanted to accompany me or would want me to bring the bag to them for further action.
I wanted to share my thoughts on the CCTV revelations, the condition in which my bag was found, the fact that it had travelled a distance of at least 14 km (Kalyaninagar-Narayanpeth), which pointed at the possibility of a gang functioning across the city.
“No need. You get your documents. That is all we want,” Saswade told me.
To me it seemed the police were not much interested in questioning the people who found the bag and ignored such incidents without any investigation.
It seems that the police are so busy with rape and murder cases that they don’t have the time to look into such rackets run by women.
Though I was lucky to have got my bag and documents back, I lost a digital camera and the cash that I was carrying.
Besides, I was under stress for 24 hours thinking that a criminal could misuse my personal information, addresses and pictures of my kids for nefarious purposes.
Unless the city police acts with alacrity and busts such gangs many more women might have to undergo the trauma that I underwent.
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