It is not uncommon at all for small things to vanish frequently. May be a watch, a wallet, even a piece of jewellery. You may be in an area of pickpockets, or a bad neighbourhood or simply in the company of kleptomaniacs. But what some thieves in Ranchi have managed to steal is mindboggling.
They have managed to steal entire railway coaches off the tracks. Brand new Air-conditioned coaches of new trains like Sampark Express have gone missing, and the people at the Railway Ministry are wondering whether they have vanished onto platform 9 ¾ to be taken to Hogwarts.
Indian Railways’ Ranchi Division is claiming that new coaches of premium trains like Rajdhani Express and Sampark Kranti Express have gone missing from the yard. The authorities are also admitting that they do not know where the Delhi-Ranchi train coaches could have gone.
The railway authorities had earlier laid claims to stolen items like missing bedsheets, berths, fans and steel tumblers. But now the thieves have reached new levels of mastery because it does sound some magical feat when entire coaches are missing, and imagine the trick required to drag the coaches where no tracks go.
Image Credit: indiarailinfo
But this kind of misguided theft is not new in India. There have been cases of people stealing ATM machines in the hope that it will continue spewing cash like it is its nature. Have you seen the caged televisions in public departments or hospitals? Or chained chairs in some colleges and public institutions? Or the pens that are tied to books for complaints and suggestions?
These incidents are a reminder of the depravity of some souls to steal what it left unguarded. Another specialised area of missing objects is office supplies. According to some reports, more than 50 per cent of employees take office supplies. That makes half of us thieves. Minus some compulsive kleptomaniacs.
But the case in hand is a tragic-comic reminder of the status of our government authorities. The case of missing coaches would stump Sherlock, and he might point to the lethargic souls manning railways authority desks, who do not care enough for the system.
Hope they can locate the coaches faster because after all it belongs to the tax payer and should be kept on track, literally too.
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