77-year-old man who is notorious as the ‘Indian Charles Shobhraj’ and has allegedly been into crime for the last 52 years has been arrested from Delhi in connection with several car thefts.
Dhani Ram Mittal has an unbelievable history behind him, which includes fraudulently serving as a district court magistrate during which he released more than 2,700 accused persons from jail.
According to Delhi Police officers, Mittal had produced a forged order before the real magistrate in Haryana’s Jhajjar, telling him that the Supreme Court had ordered him to go on a leave.
“This incident happened in 1986. Mittal went on to replace the unsuspecting magistrate for two months during which he released 2,740 prisoners, either by granting them bail or acquitting them for the crimes,” said a police officer.
It was later learnt that Mittal had not taken a penny from any of those persons he had released. “His motive behind the entire episode remains mysterious even though he was acquitted by a court which had found him to be mentally unstable,” said the officer. But this was after the entire episode had resulted in 546 cases being registered against Mittal on a single day. He was exposed after the real magistrate decided to probe deep into the “Supreme Court order”.
There have been numerous other incidents involving Mittal in which he used his “forging talent”, fetching him the nicknames ‘Indian Charles Shobhraj’ and ‘Super Natwarlal’. The police said Mittal had been arrested several times in the past for incidents ranging from impersonation to escaping from police custody. He had also allegedly impersonated policemen.
Belonging to a middle-class family in Haryana’s Bhiwani, Mittal had early in his career procured a job with the Indian Railways on the basis of forged documents and had worked as a station master for six years, beginning 1968. Mittal’s criminal career began from the road transport office in Rohtak where he indulged in forgery to prepare driving licences and registration papers of vehicles. One such crime led to his first arrest in 1964,” said Pushpendra Kumar, DCP (West). Two notable lawful activities indulged by him in all those years were pursuing a LLB degree from Rajasthan in 1970 and then learning calligraphy in Kolkata. After that, he worked as an accountant (Muneem) at the Patiala House Court in Delhi and even practised at some district courts in Delhi and Haryana, during which he impersonated the magistrate.
Of late, Mittal had allegedly been indulging in vehicle thefts across five States, including Delhi. “He is a proclaimed offender in a vehicle theft case registered in Chandigarh. He had stolen a car belonging to an advocate of the Punjab and Haryana High Court,” said the DCP.
The accused primarily targeted old cars which were not equipped with anti-auto theft devices. “He used a master key to steal the cars. He is aware of all the technical formalities required for registering a second-hand vehicle. For registration, he would forge invoices and no-objection certificates of transport authorities and then sell the car through genuine dealers,” the DCP said.
A tip-off on Thursday led to Mittal’s arrest near Rohini Court by the West Delhi’s Anti-Auto Theft Squad that was supervised by ACP (Operations) Dinesh Kumar, led by Inspector Raj Pal Dabas, and comprised policemen Sumer Singh, Satish Kaushik, Ajay Kumar, and Naveen Kumar. Mittal is currently wanted in connection with 127 cases registered against him in five states. Probe into his possible involvement in other cases is on.
Of late, he had allegedly been indulging in vehicle thefts across five States
