KARACHI, Oct 13: As many as 106 people were deprived of their cellular phones, cars or motorbikes in various localities of the city on Friday.

About 76 complaints were registered about cellphone snatchings and thefts across the city. Similarly, a total of 30 vehicles were taken away in different parts of the city.

Out of 76 mobile phones taken away, 29 were snatched at gunpoint, 40 were stolen and seven others were reported missing.

A total 39,216 cellular phones were either snatched or stolen from Jan 1 to Oct 12 this year. Besides, 4,056 people reported that they were not sure if their mobile phones went missing or got stolen. The figure shows that 139 people are robbed of their mobile phones every day in Karachi or more than five persons every hour on an average.

The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority, which had launched mobile jamming system, claimed that more than 4,800 cellphones reported as snatched or stolen had been made dysfunctional since the system was introduced on Sept 30.

Around 30 vehicles, including 13 cars and 17 motorcycles, were taken away on Friday.

One car was snatched at gunpoint and 12 others were reported stolen. Similarly, five motorcycles were taken away at gunpoint and 12 others were stolen.

Meanwhile, police unearthed a gang involved in smuggling cellular phones to upcountry and recovered eight stolen mobile phones following the arrest of three suspects on Friday.

North Nazimabad police arrested two mobile phone snatchers, who confessed to have sold out 50 to 60 snatched mobile phones to Wajid Shah in Pathan Colony.

Police picked up Wajid Shah, who informed the police that he smuggled these stolen phones to Mardan and other towns of the NWFP for onward selling.

North Nazimabad SHO Salman Waheed told Dawn that a passenger bus was made hostage by some bandits, who robbed the passengers of their cellphones and cash on Wednesday.

“One of the passengers informed the police that the bandits had escaped in a rickshaw. This was the lead. Police put a strict surveillance in the area and managed to arrest Yaseen and Naseeb Jamal, the mobile phone snatchers and recovered a mouser gun, a dagger and two cellphones from them,” he said.

They told the police that they sold stolen phones to Wajid Shah, who was picked up subsequently and six stolen phones were recovered from him.

He said that Wajid Shah also disclosed that two more gangs of Khalid D’Silva and Zada were in touch with him and they would sell stolen phones to him. Police were looking for the two gangs and asked the passengers to visit the police station and identify their cellphones as they were not shown stolen yet on the record of police and the CPLC.