Mumbai: Twelve individuals from Mumbai and the Thane region, including two 17-year-old boys from Amravati and three women from Pune were booked under nine FIRs at Bandra police station on Sunday, the opening day of the week-long Bandra Fair that will continue till September 21. The suspects, aged between 17 and 35, are from Amravati, Pune, Nirmal Nagar (Bandra East), Santa Cruz and Ambivli in Thane district.
About The Case
According to the police, the accused had travelled to the fair posing as devotees to steal mobile phones, gold chains and pickpocket worshippers. The Amravati teenagers were caught attempting to steal mobile phones, while the three Pune women who already have theft cases against them for incidents during the Dagdusheth Ganpati festival were nabbed while trying to steal gold ornaments.
Assistant Inspectors Vikram Patil and Bajrang Jagtap led a 35-member team from police stations between Bandra and Versova, working under the supervision of DCP-zone 9, Dikshit Gedam. Around 50,000 devotees visited the first day of the 300-year-old fair, which also marked the reopening of the restored Mount Mary Basilica.
Mumbai Police said they are developing strategies to counter organised thefts by criminals posing as devotees. In 2018, Bandra police had similarly arrested three women chain-snatchers from Chennai during the festival, for whom an interpreter was arranged as they spoke only Tamil.
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