To beat the heat, thieves decamp with ice cream - and deep-freezer- from Mumbai supermart!
Darpan News Desk IANS, 02 Jun, 2023 01:03 PM
Mumbai, June 2 (IANS) AIn a bizarre crime, two thieves allegedly stole a freezer and scores of kilos of ice-cream at the dead of the hot summer night from a closed supermart in Borivali suburb, a police official said on Friday.
The incident, which happened around 2 a.m. on May 28, came to light after a complaint by Jayesh R. Patel, owner of Daily Needs Grocery & Bakery in IC Colony supermart , north-west Mumbai and scanning the CCTV cameras there, said Senior Police Inspector Sudhir Kudalkar of MHB Police Station.
Immediately, Kudalkar set up a crack team comprising Akhilesh Bombe, Sandeep Gorde, Praveen Jopale, Arjun Aher, Ganesh Shermale, Sandeep Parit to solve the strange theft within barely three hours.
The CCTV footage showed two shop helpers - Omaram D. Rabaria, 24 and Votaram B. Meghwal, both residents of Nalasopara town in Palghar - helping a tempo worker to load the heavy freezer on the vehicle to deliver it to their home.
Though the supermart, in a densely populated residential neighbourhood, was closed at that dark hour, the furtive trio managed to quietly break it open.
They can be seen entering into the cold storage area from where they selected the old heavy duty Blue Star deep-freezer stacked with a large quantity of ice-creams intended for the supermart customers.
From the CCTV footage, the probe team tracked down the tempo to Vasai town and apprehended the driver who spilled the beans on the cool operation, and the police caught the accused duo based on their phone numbers shared with the transporter.
"We have recovered the deep-freezer worth around Rs 1.25 lakh and some packets of ice-creams of 33 varieties worth around Rs 20,000," said Kudalkar.
Meanwhile, videos of the "cold-blooded" theft at the height of a sweltering summer have gone viral on social media networks with many commenting at the cool-cat heist involving the deep-freezer instead of some other valuable stuff stocked in the supermart.
Finance Minister Harpal Singh Cheema and Health Minister Balbir Singh said the inauguration program would be held in Amritsar on January 27. The Chief Minister will inaugurate the clinics, while AAP convenor and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal will attend the programme as the chief guest.
A police official said that during normal checking of vehicles on Sunday night in Imphal, two persons were apprehended and the drugs, smuggled from Myanmar, were recovered from their procession. The drug peddlers, identified as Md. Abdul Salam and Md. Wasim Akram, have been arrested under the Narcotics Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act.
The bodies of a married couple and their two children, aged three and 11, were found metres from the border on Jan. 19, 2022. Investigators have said they believe the deaths were linked to a human smuggling operation, and a man charged in the U.S. is to stand trial later this year.
A video showing the woman's ordeal has gone viral on social media in which she is seen lying on the ground in a public place. The incident took place on Thursday and the woman, identified as Kalpana, was "turned back without check-up".
The Chief Minister, while interacting with the media after reviewing the progress of development projects worth Rs 167 crore in the city, said it is ironic that the Maharajas in power were more concerned about their own development rather than that of the city. He said though Patiala was known as 'City of Gardens' but due to apathy of those in power, the city lost its shine in the last few years.
Punjab Police's former Head Constable Gagandeep Singh, who planted the bomb at the court complex on December 23, 2021, was killed as it suddenly went off. Six others were injured. The case was initially registered at a Ludhiana police station, but later, it was taken over by the NIA.
