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Inter-state car theft racket busted

BERHAMPUR: An inter-state car theft racket was unearthed in Ganjam district.

The miscreants involved in this racket were bringing stolen cars from outside the State to Ganjam district to re-register them to sell them to gullible buyers.

Police initiated action in this case after getting a complaint from the local Regional Transport Officer (RTO).

A couple of Berhampur, Surya Narayan Sahu and his wife Pushpita Kumari Sahu were arrested by Chatrapur police in relation to this racket on Wednesday.

They were sent to Chatrapur sub-jail as their bail plea was rejected.

But the mastermind of this racket Ranjan Patra is now lodged in Lucknow jail in Uttar Pradesh.

He is a noted criminal of the city who was recently arrested by the UP police in relation to illegal smuggling of marijuana to Uttar Pradesh from Orissa. A team of Orissa police is expected to visit Lucknow to interrogate him. The arrested woman Pushpita is the sister of Ranjan.

As per the FIR filed by the RTO in the Chatrapur police station, four stolen cars had been re-registered by miscreants in his office.

Complaint

Basing on the complaint and data provided by the office of the RTO, police have been able to track down seven stolen cars from outside the State that have been sold in Orissa.

Investigating police officials have also found information about 21 such stolen vehicles from outside the State sold in Orissa.

The RTO officials had got suspicious when they found the engine and chassis numbers of four cars brought for registration did not match with their claimed owners and they were found to be registered in names of persons living outside the State . The documents of these vehicles were also found to be fake.

These cars were from Chhattisgarh. All these second-hand vehicles had been sold to gullible persons by Ranjan, his sister and his brother-in-law. Proper checking of registration and chassis numbers of these suspicious vehicles with the National Crime Record Bureau data base confirmed their dubious origin.

It may be noted that in 2007 similar racket had come to the fore in Kandhamal district of south Orissa.

Cars stolen from different parts of the country were being re-registered in Kandhamal district and sold to gullible persons.

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