Carelessness on the part of drivers when
it comes to security for their cars, a thriving business
in the sale of stolen parts and a lax legal system that
sees car thieves back on the streets a month after being
arrested are the main reasons for high levels of car theft
in the Punjab, senior police officers told Daily Times.
According to police data, 132,247 vehicles,
including cars and motorcycles, were stolen in the Punjab
from 1978 to 2003. The police recovered 35,971 of these.
There are around 2.9 million registered vehicles in the
Punjab and another 20,000 are registered every year.
Officials of the anti-car lifting cell
say most vehicles do not have a security system, such
as alarms or secret locks, making it easier for criminals
to break in.
“But the real problem is carelessness,”
one official said. “Most drivers do not bother to
find a safe place to park their vehicle or even ensure
that their vehicle is locked and the windows are up. Many
of them also leave valuables inside in visible places,
which increases the risk of theft.”
“Most motorcycles and cars are stolen
within five minutes of being parked,” he said. “Professional
thieves use a master key or use a metal tool to jam oipen
car doors between the door and window panels.”
There are two common fates for stolen
cars. They are taken to the tribal areas and sold there
to dealers, or are stripped for spare parts. The latter
makes the most popular models in the public also popular
targets for thieves.
Toyota, Honda and Suzuki cars and Honda
and Yamaha motorcycles have good resale value and their
auto parts are always in demand.
“It doesn’t take long to strip
a car of its parts and replace them with old ones so it
looks completely different, making it hard to identify,”
a former car thief told Daily Times.
Bilal Gunj market, the biggest auto parts
market in the province, is full of parts from stolen vehicles,
the police officials said. “There are around 2,500
shops in the market selling spare parts from stolen vehicles.
Many of the businessmen are also police informers so they
are generally safe from action,” one official said.
Stolen cars are often used in other crimes.
Stolen vehicles were used in the assassination of MNA
Maulana Azam Tariq and in the attempted assassination
of President Pervez Musharraf. The owners of stolen cars
are subsequently considered as suspects in the crimes
their cars were used in.
According to a study by the anti car-lifting
cell, 60 percent of car thieves are given bail within
a month of being arrested, and most of them return to
crime. The law should be amended and made much more strict,
said the police officials. Police officials said the “common
sense approach” was the best protection against
vehicle theft.
There are a number of gadgets available
to protect vehicles. A steering wheel lock is a metal
bar designed to prevent the steering wheel; a steering
column collar jams the ignition system; alarms come equipped
with motion and impact sensors that trigger a 120-decibel
siren and automatically switch the engine off within a
few seconds; smart keys contain coded computer chips or
operate at certain radio frequencies so the engine of
the vehicle does not turn without the exact key; and the
vehicle’s engine or chassis number can be sand-blasted
on to windscreens so the thief cannot sell the vehicle.
Number of cars stolen and recovered (1978-2003)
No Year Stolen Recovered
1 1978 0 0
2 1979 2 1
3 1980 92 16
4 1981 5 1 5 1982 9 1
6 1983 12 3
7 1984 16 5
8 1985 26 1
9 1986 29 7
10 1987 40 9
11 1988 72 26
12 1989 425 228
13 1990 2,126 833
14 1991 3,665 1,809
15 1992 2,845 1,551
16 1993 3,315 1,966
17 1994 4,121 2,788
18 1995 5,111 3,042
19 1996 3,880 1,989
20 1997 6,086 3,391
21 1998 8,267 3,835
22 1999 3,941 2,211
23 2000 3,786 2,118
24 2001 4,375 2,403
25 2002 3,650 1,804
26 2003 4,115 1,319
Total: 60,011 29,239
Number of motorcycles and rickshaws stolen
and recovered (1978-2003)
No Year Stolen Recovered 1 1978 1 1
2 1979 2 0
3 1980 24 6
4 1981 6 0
5 1982 5 1
6 1983 12 0
7 1984 51 0
8 1985 23 2
9 1986 61 4
10 1987 87 8
11 1988 129 20
12 1989 412 105
13 1990 694 203
14 1991 4,063 560
15 1992 3,128 672
16 1993 3,109 778
17 1994 3,514 687
18 1995 5,079 925
19 1996 4,818 1,016
20 1997 8,009 2,049
21 1998 8,215 2,394 22 1999 4,665 1,242
23 2000 5,519 1,502
24 2001 6,220 1,652
25 2002 6,602 1,697
26 2003 7,788 1,208
Total 72,236 16,732
