Odisha: 262 criminals held in property-related offences in last two months

BHUBANESWAR: The commissionerate police has arrested 262 criminals, mostly involved in property-related offences in Bhubaneswar; during the last two months of lockdown.
Over 230 mobile phones, 71 vehicles, 15 laptops, 34 batteries, cash of Rs 2,18,780,7 illegal firearms, 28 bullets and 394 grams of stolen gold were recovered from the accused during the period under the Bhubaneswar urban police district (UPD) area.
“Even though our personnel were busy on Covid duty on streets, at hospitals and crematorium, they worked hard and solved several pending property-related cases, mostly dealing with snatching, theft, robbery and dacoity. Many of the recovered stolen articles were handed to the rightful owners at their doorsteps in view of the lockdown and weekend shutdown,” deputy commissioner of police Uma Shankar Dash said.
The city police had recently laid emphasis on taking steps to prevent and crack property-related offences. Such crimes, including 1862 theft, 350 burglary; 388 robbery and 34 dacoity cases were reported in Bhubaneswar last year, according to the statistics of the commissionerate police. Detection of property-related offences as well as recovery of the booty and arrest of the accused used to be a cause of concern. Police said the recovery percentage has improved in the last few months.
While the police had successfully solved all the 34 dacoity cases and arrested 150 people, the detection rate of robbery, burglary and theft stood at 58.25 %, 41.26 % and 41.36 %, respectively in 2020. The detection of dacoity, robbery; burglary and theft cases had stood at 85.71 %, 62.78 %, 48.66 % and 36.58 %, respectively in 2019.
The police developed two web-based applications — Kundli and Sandhanto — to create a database of criminals involved in property-related offences and trace the real owners of the recovered items. An organised crime in property offences (OCPO) cell has been functioning at the DCP’s office to monitor such cases. Besides, property offence prevention and detection (POPD) teams and C60 teams were formed at each police station in Bhubaneswar to tackle such crimes.