CHITRAL, Aug 11: Chitral police have launched a campaign against vehicles with fake registration numbers. Scores of vehicles have been impounded by police. In view of the campaign, many owners have confined their vehicles within their homes while some reports suggest that a good number of vehicles have been parked in fields in order to conceal them from police.

Personnel of the CIA police have been called in from Peshawar to identify the vehicles whose chassis and engine numbers have been counterfeited.

Most of such vehicles appear to be comparatively new. They have been sold for between Rs70,000 and Rs130,000 by smugglers involved in the business for the last three years.

A motor mechanic told this correspondent that a car with genuine registration documents was sold at Rs400,000 in the market but the same car without proper papers was available at Rs100,000.

It is believed that these vehicles have been stolen or snatched at gunpoint from Punjab and Sindh and their fake registration numbers prepared by counterfeiting the chassis and registration numbers, something substantiated by the process carried out by the CIA police in Chitral.

A gang of car smugglers has been active in the district in connivance with police across the country.

DPO Mohammad Akbar Nasir launched the campaign against such vehicles soon after assuming charge of his office last month.

Some people tried to rouse public sentiment against the crackdown and even convened a meeting of all political parties but failed to get their support.

The move has full public support as the increasing number of such vehicles has created traffic problem in the city and the number of accidents had increased manifold.