PATNA: They first stole the track. Then they covered their tracks well. And now the police is busy tracking the culprits who escaped with 2km long railway track and its scrap in Madhubani district, under Samastipur railway division in Bihar.
Bizarre? Not quite, if you consider that in earlier instances, thieves have escaped with a mobile tower, rail engine and an iron bridge in the state. In the latest case, an FIR has been lodged at Darbhanga Railway Protection Force post, officials said on Monday. Two personnel, including an assistant sub-inspector, have been put under suspension. An inquiry has also been ordered.
“It is being ascertained whether the old railway track connecting Lohat sugar mill to Pandaul railway station belonged to the Railways or it was a property of the mill,” Virendra Kumar, chief public relations officer, said. The mill has been closed since 1996. At many places, tracks have got covered with sand and went ‘missing’. “Old records will throw light on the ‘missing’ tracks,” Kumar said.
Though the theft was discovered on January 24, it remained under wraps and caught the attention of senior officers when action was initiated against ASI Mukesh Kumar Singh and Jhanjharpur outpost in-charge Srinivas. An official said a father-son duo, Anil Yadav and Rahul Kumar, has been detained.
Rahul had worked for a business that processed scrap at the mill.
A similar incident took place in November last year, when a mobile tower was stolen from Yarpur-Rajputana area in Patna. Property worth Rs 19 lakh was taken away by thieves. In another case, thieves took the bridge on Sone river at Dehri-on-Sone in Rohtas district.
Parts of a railway engine were also stolen from a railway yard in Barauni. The police nabbed seven persons who said they had scaled the boundary wall and escaped with parts of the engine in gunny bags.