A wave of thefts mar festive season for Chandigarh channel partners

With the increasing number of thefts of laptops and desktops the channel
community of Chandigarh is a worried lot and is taking security very seriously.

The festive season of Deepawali has brought along thieves striking at
different places and there have been instances of companies facing theft of
high-end IT products like laptops and monitors.

In one such an incident, few days back, Mohali showroom of Beyond Computers
was robbed and the thieves made good with IT goods worth more than Rs 2.5 lakh.
"We lost three laptops, four LCD monitors and some other products.
Obviously, the thieves were well aware of what they were stealing and must have
come in a car in the dead of night, otherwise they would not have taken it all
so easily. We have already lodged a police complaint and are hoping that the
culprits would be brought to book," said IP Singh, Director, Beyond
Computers.

In a similar incident, in July, Sector 34-based Parametric Infosolutions Pvt
Ltd was robbed, in the dead of night and thieves got away with laptops and
desktops worth more than Rs 10 lakh.

"Thieves broke open four locks and took out all the laptops lying in the
shop. They also took away desktops and some other material. We registered a case
with the local police and so far they have not been traced. However, the police
is yet to give us a 'Non-Tra-ceable' rep-ort. This report is needed to file
for the insurance cover. These thieves know that it is easy to take and sell
laptops anywhere, so they are targeting dealers having big stake in laptops and
desktops," informed, Rajat Gupta, Director at Parametric Infosolutions.

Interestingly, sources close to the Chandigarh channel market have informed
that there were two failed attempts to steal in a similar manner from Binary
Infotech as well as Diksha Computers. Both these attempts happened during the
past 15 days only, but fortunately for these two companies — the burglars
could not take away anything as the guards thwarted their efforts and they had
to flee.

"These thieves know that festive season is about to start and there is
stock lying with us. So may be they are trying to take advantage of this. We
have now started to take security more seriously. We have proper security
systems in place now and hope that the police acts quickly and the thieves are
caught soon," Singh added.

The channel community in Chandigarh is hoping that the police will act
quickly and the culprits will soon be brought to book.

Zia Askari

Chandigarh