A complaint was lodged at Khallikote police station on December 7 complaining about the theft of a concrete mixer machine.
Arrested film producer and scrape dealer
Police on Sunday arrested a film producer on charges of stealing a concrete mixer machine from Khallikote area in Ganjam district. The arrested person has been identified as Supanshu Mohanty, a resident of Mehendi Nagar village under Kendrapara Sadar police limits.
According to the police, one Pramod Sahu of Karan Sahi reached Khallikote police station on December 7 to lodge a complaint about the theft of his concrete mixer machine from in front of Khallikote forest department office. He mentioned that someone might have stolen it in midnight.
Taking the case seriously, police launched an investigation and came across a CCTV footage in which a pickup van was seen towing the mixer machine.
The police then zeroed in on the pickup van driver. During interrogation, the driver revealed it that the machine had been sold to a scrap dealer in Bhubaneswar. Eventually, police solved the case and arrested both the thief and the scrap dealer. The recovered machine was handed over to its owner.
“He said he was in film line and showed us YouTube videos to prove his claim. From CCTV footage, we came to know that a pick up van towed the mixer machine. Then a team went to Bhubaneswar and launched an investigation there and recovered the stolen machine and arrested the thief and the scrap dealer,” informed IIC, Khalikote, Jagannath Mallik
During interrogation, Supanshu said to the police that he was a film producer and has produced YouTube films. He also said that he was a contractor with valid license.
As per reports, accused Supanshu was travelling in a bus from Bhubaneswar to Aska on December 6 when he spotted an abandoned mixer machine by the roadside and concocted a plan to steal it. With the help of a villager in Budhamba, he contacted Prakash Pradhan, who is a pickup van driver. They took the mixer machine to Bhubaneswar and sold it to a scrap dealer belonging to Mirzapur district in Uttar Pradesh.
“When police asked me, I confessed to having towed the mixer machine. But I told them that I had done this because he (Supanshu) told me he was the owner of the machine,” said Prakash Pradhan, the pickup van driver.
Accused Supanshu Mohanty said, “My brother was ill so I did the crime. But I would have returned the machine to its owner. I am a contractor with B-Class license and have done BTech with Mechanical engineering.”
The mixer machine owner, Pramod Sahu, thanked the police administration for recovering his stolen machine withing two days.
The incident has since become the talk of the town.
(Reported by Silu Biswal from Khallikote, oTV)