HYDERABAD: Thieves broke open locks of 18 shops within the jurisdictions of City, Qasimabad and Latifabad police stations on Monday and decamped with valuable goods and a large amount of cash.

The largest number of burglary incidents was reported in Hussainabad where shopkeepers protested on the main road and said that locks of a dozen shops had been broken. But, Hussainabad police claimed that only four theft incidents had been reported.

Affected shopkeepers Ali Nawaz Chachar, Khan Mohammad Otho, Sher Shoro, Mir Mohammad and others said that they were being pressurised by police not to disclose the actual number of shops that had been broken into.

Hussainabad SHO Akbar Channa said that locks of only four shops had been broken and no valuable goods had been stolen. He did not know why the shopkeepers were insisting that 12 shops had been burgled, he said.

Three similar incidents were reported within the limits of Qasimabad police station where locks of Raja fabrics, Raja cosmetics and Glamour fabrics were broken and thieves took away 23 stitched suits, prize bonds worth Rs7,500 and Rs65,900 cash, according to the affected shopkeepers.

Police said about Rs142,000 cash and one LCD TV were stolen from a franchise of a cellular phone company in Unit No. 8 Latifabad within the jurisdiction of A-Section police station.

Separately, two armed bandits deprived a salesman of a mobile phone company, Shahzad Ali, of Rs500,000 in Hala Naka area within the jurisdiction of Hatri police station on Monday when he along with a colleague was going to deposit the money in a bank.

Published in Dawn, November 13th, 2018