Maharashtra / Man steals motorcycles to travel with wife, arrested in Thane

Thane: Police have arrested a newly-married man along with five others at Manpada in Thane district for allegedly stealing motorcycles so that he could fund the expenses for taking his wife for outings, and recovered some of the stolen vehicles collectively worth over Rs five lakh, an official said on Thursday.

The accused had stolen at least 17 motorcycles, he said.

“In the recent past, there were several complaints of motorcycle thefts in and around Manpada, following which the police had formed special teams to trace the accused,” DCP (zone-III), Kalyan, S B Gunjal, told reporters in the morning.

“The team worked on several inputs, including the CCTV footage and also enquired with the local scrap dealers and garages. Police kept a watch on the suspects. During the probe, one Deepak Salgare of Ambarnath was detained. During his interrogation, he admitted that he was involved in the theft of motorcycles in Manpada, Kolsewadi, Vitthalwadi, Ambernath, Narpoli, Central and Bazarpeth police station limits,” he said.

Salagare, who was later placed under arrest, told the police that he was stealing the vehicles to get money for taking his wife to different places for outing. He would use the money that he received from the sale of the stolen bikes to meet such expenses, Gunjal added.

He had sold some of the stolen bikes through one Rahul Bhagwat Dabre, telling the buyers that they would get the vehicle documents later, he said.

He had sold some other vehicles to scrap dealer Chinmun Chouhan alias Bablu, who in turn sold them as scrap to Dharmadev Chouhan, Samsher Shabbir Khan and Bhairavsingh Premsingh Kharvad, all residents of Dombivli.

With the arrest of the six accused, the police seized some of the stolen motorcycles and other material, collectively valued at Rs 8.24 lakh, the official said.