AGRA: This was their first theft and they wanted it to be real big. So, three daily wage labourers from
Kasganj district decided on an earthmover. A JCB backhoe loader which comes for Rs 32 lakh and weighs 7,450 kg felt most suitable.
Rahul Singh (23), a native of Amapur in Kansgaj, who earlier worked as the driver of the earthmover for a contractor in Ghaziabad, made the plan with his friends, Vipin Singh (24) and Anekpal Singh (25).
Known to be a guzzler, the vehicle was hard to run on the road. It could attain a maximum speed of a little over 30 kmph and its fuel tank of 128 litre capacity emptied in no time.
The three drove it nonstop for two days and over 200 km all the way to their native place in Kasganj.
Not before they had to borrow money from wherever they could to feed gallons of fuel to their “dream-cum-mean machine” in literal oxymoron. Besides, it was painfully slow trip.
Now, they needed to earn money from the machine, more so since their creditors were after their life.
They started by visiting construction sites in the vicinity to lend the vehicle’s services for a fee but the local contractors gave them no more than a pittance. That was barely a little more than the fuel the earthmover consumed.
Amarpur station house officer Mukesh Solanki, whose team caught the trio, told TOI, “We were tipped off about three men who were ready to sell a top-model earthmover for just Rs 7 lakh and were looking or customers. This was rather odd and triggered a curiosity among us, as none of them was a contractor or real-estate developer. Therefore, we detained the trio and questioned them.”
“They were under heavy debts and did not know what to do with the earthmover,” the SHO said.
“We cross-checked with Indirapuram police of Ghaziabad and found that an FIR of a stolen earthmover was lodged against unknown persons. After verifying the details of machine, it was established that earthmover recovered from the three was the same one stolen from Ghaziabad,” Solanki added.
They were booked under IPC’s sections 379 (theft) and 411 (dishonestly receiving stolen property) and sent to jail.