It took the disappearance of more than 70 Smart City bollard lights for anyone to realise that they were not malfunctioning or awaiting maintenance, but were being stolen. By then, the thefts had been going on for months.
Since September last year, someone had been removing the decorative bollard lamps installed under the Smart City project from streets, parks, and public spaces across Thiruvananthapuram. The thefts were so gradual that they escaped attention until Smart City officials took stock of the missing fixtures and approached the police.
Though it initially appeared to be a handful of missing lights, the investigator uncovered a citywide trail of thefts. In the Cantonment police station limits alone, 77 bollard lights worth around `10 lakh had disappeared, mainly from the Palayam Martyrs’ Memorial and Ayyankali Hall areas.
Police estimate that similar thefts from parks across the capital pushed the total loss to more than `30 lakh. More complaints are expected from the Museum and Fort police station limits as Smart City completes a detailed inspection of installations there.
For the police, the challenge was figuring out how something as conspicuous as street lights were disappearing for nearly ten months without anyone noticing. The answer eventually came from hours spent poring over CCTV footage.
One camera captured a man carrying what appeared to be a bollard lamp near the Statue area. Another tracked him walking towards a scrap shop near Killipalam. The footage gave police the first solid lead.
A search at the scrap shop led to the recovery of one of the missing lamps, and the investigation soon pointed to Kannan, 38, a native of Poovar. He was soon arrested.
His method, police say, was to move around the city at night looking for an empty area to steal a lamp. Under the cover of darkness, he would walk up to a bollard light, cut the electrical wire, detach only the lamp and leave the rest of the fixture behind.
Within minutes, Kannan would move on to the next location. Police say the lamps were stolen solely for money and sold as scrap.
“The CCTV visuals showing him carrying a lamp from the Statue area towards the scrap shop near Killipalam gave us the breakthrough. The thefts had been happening for a long time. However, it came to light only after a large number of lamps had disappeared. Smart City officials are inspecting installations across the capital to identify any more missing lights before filing additional complaints. We expect more cases to be registered in the coming days in different police stations as the full extent of the thefts is documented,” says Sreekumar S, SHO of Cantonment police station.