Palamu: Two sent to judicial custody for stealing overhead electricity wire

Two thieves, who cut and stole an aerial bunch of cable of 440-volt low tension wire at Sehra village, were remanded in judicial custody today.

Officer in charge of the Lesliganj police station Gautam Roy said that the two thieves have been identified as Sunil Kumar Singh and Suchun Bhuiyan.

Sunil hails from the nearby village Khamdeeh while Suchun belongs to Chandwa block in the Latehar district.

Police have booked the two under sections 379 and 411 of the IPC.

Police officer Roy said a junior engineer of the electricity department Sanjay Khalkho lodged the FIR in this regard with the Lesliganj police station on Sunday. The thieves had hired a pickup van but its driver sensing foul play refused to carry the stolen cable and sped away from the village where this offence was committed early in the morning around 4 am on Sunday.

It was the local residents of Sehra village who had overpowered these two thieves.

One of the two arrested, Suchun Bhuiyan in a hurry to escape, fell in a village well whom the villagers pulled out only to be handed over to the Lesliganj police station.

According to the junior engineer Sanjay Khalkho, the aerial bunch cable of low tension wire worth 1.5 km was cut by these two thieves and four or five more thieves who were involved and had succeeded in cutting this overhead electricity wire managed to escape.

“Aerial bunch cable of 20 electricity poles were thus cut,” said the junior engineer electricity Khalkho.

S C Mishra, the executive engineer of the electricity Daltonganj division, said there is a modus operandi of cutting and stealing overhead electricity wire. The thieves first damage the fuse of the transformer to block any flow of current in the wire which they intend to cut and steal. A sophisticated cutter is then used to cut the overhead electric wire.

“We do not believe these cut and stolen electricity wire has any buyer in Daltonganj. There is every possibility of its being shipped from here to outside the district or Jharkhand,” he added.

A similar incident of cutting and stealing of the overhead aerial bunch cable was done sometime back in the Latehar district.