In a pan India operation against a gang allegedly involved in stealing mobile tower equipment and selling them in Hong Kong, the Delhi Police has arrested 52 people from across the country, an official statement said on Wednesday.

According to police, the gang has exported over 5,000 Remote Radio Unit (RRU), worth Rs 65 crore, abroad so far.

RRU is a transceiver which is installed on wireless base stations/mobile towers. It makes it possible to send and receive text messages.

Special Commissioner of Police (crime) Devesh Chandra Srivastva said with the arrests of 52 accused, 256 theft cases of Delhi, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Punjab, Telangana, Odisha, West Bengal, Bihar and Tamil Nadu have been worked out so far.

The pan-India operation was conducted by the Delhi Police Crime Branch in coordination with other security agencies in the past one year, official sources said.

Srivastva said that 414 RRUs, 110 Base Band Unit (BBU), 161 batteries and RRU testing machine installed by different telecommunication companies at mobile towers installed at various locations in Delhi, UP, Bihar, Odisha, Punjab, Jharkhand, Assam and West Bengal have been recovered at the instances of accused.

The recovered items are worth around Rs 10 crore The police said the arrests were made between January 18, 2023 and October 26 this year.

"On October 22, the team arrested one of the key members Zuber Malik and initially a total of 63 RRUs along with one testing machine were recovered from him,” the Special Commissioner said.

According to the police statement, one of the accused, Sagar Bhatnagar, used to transport these stolen RRUs and BBUs from Rajesh Shukla and Gurdeep Singh, who received these items from various suppliers of different states.

On inquiry, they stated that these RRUs were to be transported to Hong Kong after customs clearance, it said.

After Zuber Malik’s arrest, the gang members changed their modus operandi and started using private vehicles instead of three-wheelers for transporting RRUs from their godown to the godown of Bhatnagar, the officer said.

Team conducted a raid at a godown in Mahipalpur and Gurdeep Singh was apprehended from outside the godown, the police said.

On inquiry, he informed that Furkan had delivered him 40 RRUs for transporting the same to Hong Kong through Bhatnagar. Team conducted a raid at the godown and found 77 RRUs. Out of these, 37 RRUs had been sent by Rajesh Shukla and 40 RRUs were brought by Gurdeep, police said.

Bhatnagar was apprehended and he disclosed that he used to send these RRUs to Hong Kong on the pretext of electronic switch.

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