Praedial larceny squad makes 21 arrests after 60,000 farm visits

Agri­cul­ture and Fish­eries Min­is­ter Ravi Rati­ram says the Prae­di­al Lar­ce­ny Squad has made 21 ar­rests and se­cured about six con­vic­tions fol­low­ing 60,000 farm vis­its.

Rati­ram made the dis­clo­sure dur­ing to­day's sit­ting of Par­lia­ment’s Stand­ing Fi­nance Com­mit­tee, where he out­lined the squad’s ef­forts to tack­le theft from farm­ers and im­prove its op­er­a­tional ca­pac­i­ty.

“Out of the 60,000 farm vis­its, I can com­fort­ably tell you that we have had 21 ar­rests dur­ing the pe­ri­od,” Rati­ram said.

“We have had some con­vic­tions as well. I think it might be in the vicin­i­ty of around six con­vic­tions out of that.”

He said the squad’s fleet had in­creased from one ve­hi­cle to nine, al­low­ing of­fi­cers to con­duct more pa­trols.

“So per­sons who would have been in­volved in fool­ish­ness out­side there are to take note that the Prae­di­al Lar­ce­ny Squad no longer have one ve­hi­cle,” Rati­ram said.

“They no longer sit in the sta­tion with­out the abil­i­ty to pa­trol. They are out­side pa­trolling the ar­eas.”

Rati­ram al­so an­nounced plans to in­tro­duce drone sur­veil­lance and an air sup­port unit to strength­en the squad’s op­er­a­tions.

“We will soon be in­tro­duc­ing drone sur­veil­lance and air sup­port unit to sup­port the Prae­di­al Lar­ce­ny Squad, where we will be us­ing the tech­nol­o­gy to en­hance the agri­cul­tur­al sec­tor,” he said.

Rati­ram added that the tech­nol­o­gy would help im­prove the ef­fi­cien­cy of the squad’s op­er­a­tions.

Dur­ing the com­mit­tee pro­ceed­ings, Op­po­si­tion MP for Arou­ca/Lopinot Mar­vin Gon­za­les asked whether any of the ar­rests in­volved un­reg­is­tered mi­grants ac­cused of en­ter­ing farm­ers’ prop­er­ties and steal­ing veg­eta­bles and oth­er crops.

Rati­ram con­firmed that some ar­rests in­volved un­reg­is­tered mi­grants, re­spond­ing “yes” when asked whether the squad’s op­er­a­tions had re­sult­ed in ar­rests con­nect­ed to the is­sue.