17-yr-old girl dragged on road fighting phone snatchers, gets them arrested
NEWDELHI: Two motorcycle-borne snatchers landed in police custody, thanks to a brave 17-yearold girl who refused to part with her mobile phone even when dragged a few metres on road in a bid to save it, in north-east Delhi’s Jyoti Nagar on Wednesday evening.
The girl was lucky to have escaped with relatively minor injuries to her head and face, but the fierce fight she put up caused the snatchers’ motorcycle to lose balance and fall. “The motorcycle rider was caught on the spot. His associate was nabbed a few hours later,” said a senior police officer.
This is the third such incident within last six months in which women have received injuries while trying to resist snatchers in Delhi. In December, a woman went into coma when she fell off an auto while trying to save her bag from bike-borne snatchers on Moolchand Flyover in south Delhi.
Three months later, in March, another woman was left bed-ridden after she too fell off a running auto while trying to fight off snatchers on motorcycles. The snatchers in that case had struck on the Ring Road in IP Estate, just a few hundred metres from the Delhi Police headquarters.
The latest crime occurred on a road in Ashok Nagar, a kilometre from Jyoti Nagar police station. The victim, Babita, was walking home from work around 8 pm on Wednesday, when the snatchers targeted her.
The girl lives with her mother in Meet Nagar. She supports her family working as a salesgirl in a garments shop in Ashok Nagar.
“I was waiting at a zebra crossing at the Loni Road on my way back home, when the two men approached me on a Bajaj Dis- cover motorcycle,” the girl told police. The pillion rider allegedly tried to snatch the mobile phone from her hand, but the girl held on to her device.
Not willing to ride away without the phone, the pillion rider allegedly held on to her wrist, dragging her for a few metres. They finally managed to free the phone from Babita’s hand, but not before one final fight from her.
“That caused the motorcycle to lose balance. The rider tried to control it, but he ended up ramming another motorcycle head on,” said the investigator.
Several passersby and locals immediately gathered at the spot to catch hold of the rider, who was thrashed before being handed over to the police. The suspect was interrogated to reveal the identity of his accomplice. A midnight raid at the latter’s hideout resulted in his arrest too.