BENGALURU: The Cubbon Park police arrested a 26-year-old man from Jharkhand and his four juvenile accomplices for stealing several mobile phones during the IPL match between Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) and Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium on March 28. They recovered 21 mobile phones estimated to cost around Rs 18 lakh from them.
The 26-year-old has been identified as Shubham Kumar from Sahibganj in Jharkhand.
The five accused, wearing team jerseys, entered the stadium with tickets and stole mobile phones near the P3 stand. They also stole phones on MG Road, opposite the stadium and even near metro stations.
The police had registered 29 mobile phone theft cases after the match. The wife of one of the victims had posted on social media that her husband lost his mobile phone at the P3 stand when he went to get water after the first innings. Immediately after, some more fans lost their phones. They brought it to the notice of the policemen deployed for security duties.
"We suspect that the accused are part of an organised crime syndicate where minors are used. It appears that the juveniles travel to stadiums during IPL matches. Of the arrested, except for one, all are minors. The accused were staying at hotels in the city. We suspect that they would have gone for the April 5 match and stolen mobiles if they were not arrested," said an officer.
The police have also received information about their other associates and are hunting for them.