Varanasi: Bansdih police arrested five electric wire thieves, including a juvenile, following an exchange of fire in Ballia district late on Wednesday. Later, on the tip-off of the arrested thieves, two more members of the gang were arrested.Providing details of the late night action, Ballia ASP (Northern) Dinesh Kumar Shukla said that Bansdih police were busy in night patrolling, when they arrested four members of a gang involved in electricity wire theft, following an encounter near a brick kiln in Husainabad village. The cops took a juvenile delinquent into custody.During the cordon, the gang leader identified as Dharmendra Kumar opened fire at the police team in a bid to escape. In retaliatory firing by police, he suffered bullet injury in leg and was caught. Police recovered two country-made pistols, cartridges, a knife, a cutter machine, pickup vehicle, 6 mobile phones and Rs 690 cash from them and rushed Dharmendra to hospital. His other accomplices were identified as Deepak Sahu, Vishwakarma Turha and Nitish Patel, and one juvenile.During initial interrogation, they divulged that Anshu Singh alias Makku Singh and Samar Bahadur Singh purchased the stolen electric wires from them. Acting on the information, police also arrested Anshu and Samar and also recovered stolen wires from their possession.During questioning, they confessed their involvement in stealing electricity wires from many places in the district.
