Loader arrested for theft of 75 smartphones at IGI Airport 36 recovered

New Delhi, Mar 25 (PTI) The Delhi Police has arrested a ground handling employee for allegedly stealing a shipment of high-end smartphones worth lakhs of rupees, an official said on Tuesday.
     The accused has been identified as 28-year-old Monu alias Nikhil Kumar and 36 of the stolen mobile phones have been recovered so far, said the official.
     The case came to light when Sanjay Yadav, head of sales and marketing at cargo services, lodged an e-FIR on February 6. According to the complainant, the company had dispatched a shipment of four PVC boxes containing 280 branded smartphones from their Noida Phase II warehouse to a store in Indore on January 27. However, one of the boxes containing 75 phones was missing upon arrival.
     A team was formed to track down the culprits. Despite thoroughly scrutinising the CCTV footage from the airport's cargo loading and storage areas, no immediate clues emerged. Investigators then turned to technical surveillance, tracking the activation of stolen devices.
     "The team got a breakthrough when some stolen phones were traced to buyers who had unknowingly purchased them from a mobile dealer Suman Kumar in East Patel Nagar . Upon questioning, Suman disclosed that he had bought 27 phones from another dealer Arun Sharma for over Rs 26 lakh.
     "When customers began returning the devices to Suman due to the absence of invoices, Suman returned them to Arun Sharma," Additional Commissioner of Police (IGI) Usha Rangnani said in a statement.
     She further said investigations led to Arun Sharma in Noida, who revealed that he had purchased 34 stolen phones from one Sahil in Mathura. Of these, 27 had been sold to Suman, while he still had seven, which were also recovered. Sahil, however, remains at large.
     Another stolen phone was traced to a user in Gurugram who had purchased it from a local shopkeeper Chintu. Upon interrogation, Chintu admitted to buying two sealed phones from Nikhil Kumar for Rs 2 lakh and provided proof of online payment. This critical lead led the police to the accused.
     According to the police, during questioning, Nikhil Kumar confessed to the crime, admitting that he had been working as a loader for the past two years for a ground handling agency at IGI Airport.
     The police said Kumar saw the shipment being stored in a container at an isolated parking area and took advantage of the situation to steal one of the boxes. He initially hid the stolen phones in an old, unused container at the airport and later smuggled them out in phases, they said.
     Nikhil sold 55 phones to his friend Sahil and two to Chintu. His arrest has led to the recovery of 36 mobile phones, while efforts are ongoing to track down Sahil and recover the remaining devices. Further investigation of the matter is going on, said the Additional CP.

(This story has not been edited by THE WEEK and is auto-generated from PTI)