Snatching continues to hamper the lives of many in the national Capital with fear looming over the heads of the citizens from going out wearing their jewellary to just holding their phones in their hands. However, the efforts, including increased patrolling at entry and exit points and filing chargesheets based upon CCTV footages, of the Delhi Police in curbing this menace in the west district has proved to be deterrence for the criminals marking a 40 per cent drop in the number of PCR calls received in the area, from 3 per day this year to 5 per day in 2023.
According to official data accessed by The Pioneer, the number of PCR calls received in the West district in the current year till the period of November 30 was 971. This marks a reduction of 2 PCR calls per day as compared to 2023 when a total of 1,680 calls were received and in 2022 when 1700 calls were received.
Deputy Police Commissioner (West) Vichitra Veer recalled that when he joined as the DCP of the district he was told that nothing can be done about the snatching problem in the district. “However, when I joined I decided that I will try to do the best to solve this problem that gives a lot of trouble to the normal citizen. But now when you look at the data albeit it might not have been stopped completely we have made a serious dent,” he said.
He said that he asked his officers to register more cases upon the PCR calls and work on it. “Moreover, even when you do a disclosure-based arrest, although it reflects in your workout percentage, he eventually will not go to jail and again continue doing the same crimes. It is not easy to recover the snatched property and identification of the accused is hardly possible by the victim since they might not even have the time to look at the criminal,” the DCP stated.
The police started to use advanced FRS technology CCTVs to identify the accused and started chargesheeting the criminals based upon it, he said, adding that it led to better conviction and a deterrence to the accused who used to think that they will escape eventually.
“I also instructed my officers to keep an eye on the ones that have been previously convicted. There is a perception that the snatchers, who have gone to jail, will not repeat it. However, this might not be true entirely. Usually when such a crime is carried out two people are seated on a bike. One is an old-timer who is seated on the pillion and the new one is riding the bike. Hence, we started keeping an eye on them to stop them from further influencing others to do so,” he said.
While hotspots are not yet entirely free from such crimes, increased patrolling in the area is making the criminals to work harder to engage in such activites, he added.
Such approach has also reduced robbery calls in the district with 657 calls being received per day in 2024 till November 30, from 891 in 2023 and 924 in 2022. Also, 3544 pcr calls were received this year till November 30, 4,404 calls in 2023 and 4,136 calls in 2022 in Motor Vehicle Theft cases.
