Delhi: Gang involved in sale-purchase of stolen equipment of mobile towers busted, 3 arrested

Delhi Police Crime Branch has arrested three accused persons in connection with the sale and purchase of stolen equipment from mobile towers and recovered equipment worth Rs 2 crore from them.

The arrested individuals have been identified as Naseem alias Tiddha (32) a resident of Old Seelampur, Imran alias Ghatak (30), a resident of Old Seelampur, and Dinesh alias Deenu alias Babu (45), a resident of Kilokari, Sunlight colony.

According to police, a total of 51 Radio Remote Units (RRU) and 30 Base Band Units (BBU) have been recovered and nine cases of theft have been worked out. The car used in the transportation of RRUs/BBUs has also been recovered.According to Special Commissioner of Police Crime Ravinder Yadav, a team of the Crime Branch had earlier arrested five accused including the receiver involved in theft and illegal sale/purchase of RRU/BBU.

He said, "The nodal officer of Airtel informed that there are so many theft complaints of RRU/BBU of Ericsson and Nokia companies from different parts of the country and the TSPs had accumulated huge losses to the tune of crores in just one year. These pieces of equipment are maintained and installed by Indus Tower Limited, a registered infrastructure provider with the Department of Telecommunications, GOI, and has been engaged in providing infrastructure support to various telecom service providers. Further, the thieves, on arrest by various state police, disclosed that these RRUs/BBUs are being sent to the Trans Yamuna area of Delhi. However, the main receivers of RRUs/BBUs were still at large."

"Delhi being a transit/storage of RRUs/BBUs, it was a challenge for Delhi Police to apprehend these receivers as these gang members never used to stay at one place and changed their locations frequently," he added.

Based on the inputs and local intelligence, the team identified the kingpins of the gang Naseem and Imran. It was revealed that the accused persons purchased these items from various persons of different states and sent them to their godown situated in Mustafabad, Delhi via Railways.As part of their modus operandi, they further shifted these RRUs/BBUs to another godown situated in Jaitpur, Delhi.

The kingpins adopted a peculiar modus operandi that the stolen RRU/BBU were supplied to individual receivers of the NCR region without calling them to the godown or any particular place so that even the receivers could not recognize the storage place or disposal of the RRUs/BBUs.

Secret information was received that accused Naseem and Imran would go to Jaitpur along with stolen RRUs/BBUs kept in their car. Accordingly, a raid was conducted and accused Naseem and Imran were apprehended from Mustafabad, Delhi in a well-coordinated and swiftly executed operation. 13 RRUs and 4 BBUs were recovered from the car on their instance.

Both the accused persons Naseem and Imran were subjected to thorough interrogation and they disclosed that they have stored another lot of stolen RRUs/BBUs in their rented godown in Bhagirathi Vihar, Mustafabad, Delhi.An instant raid was conducted at their godown and 31 RRUs and 25 BBUs were recovered.Both the accused further disclosed that they used to supply these stolen items to their associate Dinesh alias Deenu and were planning to shift these stolen RRUs/BBUs to his godown in Jaitpur, Delhi.Accordingly, a raid was conducted and accused Dinesh was apprehended from his house at Kilokari, Sunlight Colony and seven RRUs and one BBU were recovered from his godown situated at D-Block, Gadda Colony Jaitpur, Delhi.

On verification, these RRUs/BBUs were found stolen from Rajasthan, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Hyderabad and Delhi and theft cases were found already registered in the respective state.

Both accused further disclosed that all communication with regard to the sale/purchase of stolen RRUs/BBUs was done through WhatsApp calls and messages. During the investigation, accused Dinesh disclosed that he had supplied 110 RRUs to one Dubai-based person, named Ali against a payment of Rs 1.8 crores in cash.

On verification, the car was found registered in the name of accused Naseem and it was used for transportation of stolen RRU/BBU from one place to another. The market value of RRU and BBU is about 1.75 lakh and 2.25 lakhs respectively.

Accused Naseem and Imran used to purchase RRU/BBU between Rs 1.2 to 1.4 lakhs while they along with accused Dinesh further sold it from Rs 1.7 lakh to 1.8 lakhs.

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