GURGAON: A 30-year-old man stopped a thief from speeding away with his mini-truck with the help of a GPS device he had installed in the vehicle. With the owner in hot pursuit, the thief gave up after 9km. He pulled by the side of a road and fled, leaving the vehicle behind.
Kala
, the thief, was arrested from Rajasthan on Saturday morning.
Around 3.30am on Friday,
Ajay Singh
- a businessman dealing in pipes - was going to sleep at his
Palam Vihar
home when the whirr of an engine alerted him. He looked out of the window and saw a man trying to start his truck. By the time
Ajay
rushed out and shouted out to his neighbours, Kala had managed to start the truck with a master ignition key. He stepped on the accelerator and fled.
"I was shocked to see a man trying to start the truck. No sooner did I shout out to him, he frantically tried to start the vehicle. By the time I was out on the road, he had fled with the vehicle," Ajay said in his police complaint.
He did not give up. Ajay gave the truck a chase in his car and activated the GPS device installed in the vehicle with the help of a software in his phone. As the thief stepped on the accelerator and went out of sight, Ajay could see its directions on the map.
The chase continued for almost 30 minutes. "
Twice
, I caught up with him and ended up crashing into the rear of the vehicle. But, he was driving very fast. Even if the truck went out of sight, I could track its movement with the help of the GPS device installed in it," he said. When Kala realised there was little chance of escape, he stopped the truck and fled. Having found his truck, Ajay dialled the cops and lodged a complaint at Palam Vihar police station. An FIR was registered under Section 379 (theft) of the IPC.
Ajaybir Singh, SHO Palam Vihar station, said, "The truck owner was prompt to activate GPS device in his truck. Had he not informed us within minutes, it could have been difficult to trace the thief."
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