The Tamil Nadu police last Sunday arrested three members of a gang that was involved in stealing a mobile tower at Vazhapadi in Tamil Nadu’s Salem district. According to the police, the gang dismantled the tower and sold it to a scrap dealer in Virudhunagar for Rs 6.40 lakh.
The police suspect that more people are involved in the theft and an investigation is under way.
Uma Shankar, the Inspector of Police, Vazhapadi told indianexpress.com that the gang, posing as authorities of a private mobile company, dismantled the tower in July after showing some fake documents to the person who was maintaining the farm on which the tower was built . The theft came to light when employees of a private company that maintained the tower took notice and filed a complaint.
The officer said that the tower was erected in 2000 by Aircel in the field of one Subramanian. As Subramanian was staying in Erode, another person had been taking care of his land in Vazhapadi. Aircel had been paying rent to the farm owner until 2017 and later a private company named GTL had taken over the tower and had been maintaining it. They had been paying rent until 2019.
As there was no other company currently looking after the tower, the perpetrators had planned to dismantle the tower and sell them to a scrap dealer. Inspector Shankar said one Shanmugam, a former employee of Aircel, had masterminded the plan.
“The men had prepared a fake document which authorizes them to dismantle the tower. The document had a sign and seal of Aircel which made the people near the farms believe that these people are from the company. They had shown the document to the person who had been maintaining the farmland and had dismantled the tower in less than two days and used a truck to transport them. This gang had worked for close to a month to plan the theft. They zeroed in on the tower which is not currently in use and hired local people to help them identify their potential targets,” the officer added.
The employees of the private mobile operator who came to know about the incident lodged a complaint on July 29. A case was registered under multiple sections including sections and 379 (theft), 420 (cheating), 419 (cheating by impersonation), 468 ( forgery for purpose of cheating) of the Indian Penal Code among others.
The police managed to nab the accused a month later. According to the police, Nagamuthu of Tirunelveli, Shanmugam of Tuticorin, and Rakesh Sharma of Vazhapadi, Salem were arrested on August 28. The police have recovered 10 tons of iron and a generator from the accused. The men were remanded and later sent to judicial custody.
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