Now, lemon theft saga plays out in Kanpur
: Amid soaring prices, lemon thieves are at it again. After Shahjahanpur, they have struck in Kanpur now.
In the past four days, thieves have taken away 15,000 lemons weighing 750 kg or 7.5 quintals from orchards here.
“Our caretakers keep a record of every single lemon. We have found out that 15,000 lemons have been stolen from different orchards in Ganga Katri,” said Chaubhi Nishad, one of the biggest growers in this belt.
Baffled by the trend, the lemon growers have hired lathiwielding guards to keep the crop safe. Lemons are grown in about 2000 bigha of land in Chaubeypur, Bithoor, Pariyar, Katri and Mandhana areas, said Rajendra Pal, the caretaker of an orchard in Bithoor Katri.“This is for the first time that we have had to hire people to protect the lemons. We are paying one guard Rs 500 a day,” he said. “Security was beefed up in last three days. The guards are on the job round the clock,” he said.
In Shivdeen Purwa, a lemon grower, Abhishek Nishad, has approached the Bithoor police. He has submitted a complaint for an FIR against unidentified people who have taken away 2000 lemons in three days.
Nishad said he has three bighas of land on which lemon is grown. During a daily count, the caretaker found 2000 lemons had been looted, he said.
“I have given the complaint for the FIR for robbery. Police have told me they are investigating. But I have got all my family members based in the orchard to make sure no more lemons are taken away,” he said.
Station house officer of Bithoor police station Amarnath Vishwakarma confirmed that he received two such complaints from the farmers.“I have sent a sub-inspector to these orchards. We are looking into the case,” he said. The retail price of just one lemon was Rs 10 at the Phoolbagh vegetable
market on Wednesday.
The wholesale price in the Badshahinaka market was Rs 250 per kg. Earlier, thieves allegedly fled with 60kg lemons, 40kg onions and 38kg garlic from a warehouse under the Tilhar police station limits in Shajahanpur district on Monday. “We got a call from a green grocer complaining about the theft of lemons, onions and garlic,” Umesh Singh Solanki, inspector of Tilhar police station, had said. Solanki had mentioned skyrocketing prices as a possible reason for the theft.