Two persons were targeted by armed snatch gangs and five vehicles were stolen - one of them hijacked by men posing as foresters - in and around Bokaro steel city in the past 12 hours, exposing the dearth of active policing despite reviews and reprimand.

A schoolteacher and resident of Sector VI in the steel city, Umesh Mandal was walking home around 9.45pm on Tuesday when two youths accosted him with a gun near Sector V petrol bunk. They punched him to relieve him of his mobile phone and the Rs 1,000 cash he was carrying in his wallet.

"I was ambushed bang in the middle of the city. I had to hunt for a PCR van to lodge a complaint after being robbed at gunpoint and finally found one near Patharkatta Chowk (Sector I crossing). This proves how hollow promises of heightened patrolling by Tiger Mobile cops are," the teacher couldn't help but vent his frustration.

Around the same time on Tuesday, two men on a bike targeted homemaker Usha Devi in Sector III while she was enjoying an evening stroll with her husband. The duo tried to snatch her gold chain, managed to grab only a portion of the ornament that snapped and left the woman bruised in the process.

"The bikers sped away towards Bokaro Mall. We have lodged a police complaint, but are not sure if the snatchers will be caught," Usha Devi echoed teacher Mandal.

Later on Tuesday night, an SUV belonging to Gomia block pramukh Gulab Chand Hansda was stolen from his residence, 60km from the steel city. A case has been registered with IEL Gomia police station.

Between Tuesday afternoon and evening, three bikes were stolen from Sector I, II and XII. The first belonged to Vishal Kumar who was shopping at Ram Mandir market while the second is owned by Prem Prakash Mishra and was lifted from his home. Cases have been filed at City police station. The bike stolen from a Sector XII residence belonged to J.K. Chowdhry who has lodged a complaint with local police.

Around 10pm on Tuesday, four men in an SUV intercepted a tractor on Gomia-Vishnugarh highway, 65km from city, posing as forest officials. Driver Sunil Manjhi was abandoned in a jungle 15km away after the men hijacked his heavy vehicle at gunpoint. Owner of the tractor, Reetlal Thakur, later lodged a robbery case at Gomia police station.

At a marathon meeting on Sunday, district police chief Y.S. Ramesh had read out the riot act to his juniors, asking them to perform or perish. The stinging censure came in the wake of 96 cases of snatchings, robberies and burglaries in Bokaro in the past two months. But, action on the ground has been zero if the spate of crimes in the past 12 hours are taken into account.

SP Ramesh conceded that the crime graph was sprinting in urban and semi-urban Bokaro. "I have asked OCs to fix accountability for the crimes that have taken place in areas under their respective jurisdictions. Raids are on to nab the criminals," he said.

City DSP Ajay Kumar claimed a few new gangs had cropped up after some jailed criminals were set free. "We are preparing a list of such people and will monitor their movements to crack the cases," he added.