SURAT, Dec 21: The transfer of Police Commissioner Maniram from Surat comes in the wake of a string of sensational crimes over the past six months. Ironically, his six-month tenure outlasted a series of horrifying incidents of rape and murder, the brutal beheading of two youth from UP, communal tension during the Ganesh utsav and labour unrest, and it took the killing of a BJP councillor to see him moved out.Though Maniram - speaking after receiving his transfer orders - said he was satisfied with his work here, he admitted that the transfer was a result of the murders and the inability of the police to detect them. ``Nitaben Satbhaya's murder was unfortunate, but cracking such cases quickly is a real test of the police's abilities,'' he said.Numerous petitions have been submitted by school teachers, traders, the Congress and even the city BJP to the collector and the commissioner criticising the rise in serious crimes during the recent past. Even state Home minister Haren Pandya, on a recent visit to the city, had acknowledged that the crime situation here had definitely reached worrying proportions.In three cases of armed robberies accompanied by murders, persons were murdered in broad daylight at Mahidharpura, Gopipura and Navapura areas of the city. While two traders were gunned down during the daylight loots in the Mahidharpura and Navapura cases, a trader was killed in the Gopipura incident.Barely a month ago, two schoolgirls aged 10 and six, studying in an SMC school in the Ashwini Kumar area, were kidnapped by unidentified persons; one of them was raped and the bodies of both were recovered a couple of days later from a field near Tadkeshwar, 65 kilometres off the city. The police are still clueless about the murder.Similarly, no headway has been made in the beheading of two youth from UP whose bodies were recovered on the outskirts of Dindoli village near the city in October.The sensational murder of Ashit Africawala, alias Bunty, in November has also gone undetected. While the police have zeroed in on Farooq Munshi as one of the four murderers and the mastermind behind it, no arrests have been made in the case. Africawala, a land broker, was killed in broad daylight in the Rander area by assailants carrying sharp weapons. It has been established that both the deceased and Munshi had underworld links.Added to all this is the labour unrest where, on two occasions, rampaging migrant workers created large-scale destruction in the city.
