South cops unravel stolen car fencing nexus, seize 6 vehicles

NAMCHI, 28 June: The South District Police has unravelled a stolen car dealing nexus which it had stumbled upon last month and it has now been established that the network of car-jackers and fencers was wide, stretching from Sikkim to Madhya Pradesh and surrounding states. The case busted, the cops now have six stolen vehicles in their custody, even as investigations continue to get to the bottom of things.
SP [South], Manoj Tiwari, today informed that in connection with the Ravangla Police Station case of 07 May 2011 booked under Section 379/467/471/34 of the IPC [which deals with stolen vehicles], four Boleros and one Santro have been seized from Ravangla along with one Scorpio from Jorethang. All have been confirmed as stolen vehicles sold into Sikkim.

The case begins from a Santro parked at Mangaley in an apparently abandoned condition. As learnt from a reliable source, some of the area people noticed this car with Jharkhand registration plates parked in the garden of Manglay Power House. When some days passed without the car having been taken away, they informed the police outpost nearby.
Police investigation led them to one Raju Rai of Manglay who was identified as the person who had left the vehicle there. Police detained him and during interrogation, he revealed that the car was given to him by one Vikash Prasad, son of Shanker Prasad of Singtam, East Sikkim.
The SP South informs that Vikash Prasad was then detained and from his possession, the Police recovered insurance documents the vehicle and papers to show that it had been purchased from United India Company Ltd., Dhanbad, by Arvind Kumar Prasad of Singtam.
The police were however already sniffing a nexus here and sure enough, it was soon discovered that Arvind Kumar Prasad had been dead for three years. The documents were obviously fake. The accused was placed under arrest.
According to the SP, the accused revealed that he had brought 10 stolen vehicles from Ajay Chauhan and Anupam Barua who had been involved in a stolen vehicle racket and were arrested by Sadar Police in connection with Sadar Police case number 79 & 80 (06) 2011 and are now in Sagar Jail in Madhya Pradesh.
The SP further informed that on his revelation, a total of 06 vehicles were recovered from various places of Sikkim out of which one vehicle had already been registered in Sikkim. The verification of registration numbers and owners is being processed at present, he added.
According to the SP, these vehicles were stolen from West Bengal, Jharkhand and Madhya Pradesh.