A STUDENT of a private university — Habibur Rahman, along with his three friends recently got on a bus from Farmgate to go back home at Malibagh and he sat in a window seat for a smooth journey. When the bus got stuck in traffic jam at Karwanbazar, he received a phone call from his girlfriend and got immersed in deep conversation only to fall victim to a snatcher who suddenly took away the phone set through the window. Stunned, he saw the snatcher running away, according to a media report.
This is one of the incidents of snatching the city dwellers experience every day as various gangs popularly known as ‘Tana Party’ are on the prowl.
Snatchers have become active again even in broad daylight and after the dusk in almost every city across the country observing the relaxed mood of law enforcement agencies. The muggers and other organised criminals do not fear of the nearness of law enforcers and suddenly escape after snatching valuables. Many alleged that various gangs are on the prowl while the law enforcers remain busy in political programmes or in protocol duty of VIPs. Particularly, those coming from outside the capital — passengers of buses, launches, and trains — are the most common targets of these gangs.
Sometimes, the snatchers also become violent. At least three people died and several others were injured in recent months being victims of doping gangs (ogyan party). Most victims don’t file cases to avoid hassles. They prefer to remain silent because filing of the cases hardly brings any result. Police sometimes arrest muggers but they get an acquittal from the court.
The Police Headquarters database shows judgments in 213 cases in connection with acts of mugging involving 589 accused were delivered from January to September 2017. Only 88 accused were punished in 41 cases.
Police have no statistics as how many numbers of ‘pick-and-run’ incidents occur in a day or month. It is the duty of the tax-fed police to protect general people but the poor and kleptocratic governance keeps them detached from performing their duty.
