Tree guards stolen in Abohar

For the last few days, the tree guards installed to safeguard the plants in different areas of the town by Green City and other non-government organisations were being stolen by unknown suspects.

Days after planting saplings and installing tree guards around them, members of Green City intercepted some women early morning and found they had been stealing tree guards and other goods that were likely to be sold to various scrap dealers in the city.

The police here had recently caught some miscreants who had sold stolen products to scrap dealers and arrested three of them. Earlier, goldsmiths, jewellery traders and owners of mobile phone shops had resolved not to buy items from strangers without ID verification. However, a mobile phone shop owner breached the pledge. It had also surfaced that goods stolen from colonies in the town were sold to scrap dealers in rural areas.

Dr Amandeep and other members of Green City said during a morning tour of the main roads to take care of the saplings, the members were told that some women collecting garbage had stolen the tree guards. He said their team chased the women, but the latter dumped two bags full of junk near the timber market and fled.

Dr Amandeep said when they opened the bags, apart from tree guards and saplings, they found utensils used by tea vendors, a hammer, some pipes and flax boards in the bags. He said the members contacted the police helpline; however, no one reached the site for about an hour, adding that it gave the women sufficient time to flee.

Residents said some miscreants had targeted Aam Aadmi Clinics near JP Park and Patel Nagar within seven days. They said it appeared to be the handiwork of drug addicts who can be found roaming in the JP Park and neighbouring Maharana Pratap Market, but no raid was conducted to nab the miscreants. They said the police were clueless about these thefts that affected medicos and hundreds of visiting patients.