slap and grab
Heard this story through a friend, thought i should share.
A girl is standing at a bus stop, waiting to catch a bus to go home and talking on her cellphone. There are quite many people around and its daytime.
Two guys on a bike pull up in front of her, the guy on the back gets off the bike, comes in front of her, and without warning, plants a loud slap right on her face! The girl is stunned, cant even utter a word. He then shouts (for the benefit of whoever is listening) “kitney dafa bola hai! Abba ka cellphone nahi lay kar nikla karo” (how many times have i told you, not to take dads cellphone out), grabs her cell, gets back on the bike, and they both drive away.
The girl is too shocked to say anything and just stands there, her hand holding an imaginary cellphone to her ear. People around ignore the situtation thinking its just some family tiff or the other…. till she screams out “ye mera bhai nahi tha!!!!!!!” (he was not my brother!!!!!)
By then its too late to do anything. Another cellphone lost, another victim scarred for life. Sadly, this is not the first slap and grab cellphone snatching i’ve heard of, especially with females in the city, and it definately wont be the last. Its incidents like these that i support the ban on pillion riding to some extent.
good comical description of the incident. talking on the cell phone in public is not a very good idea. one should be careful while using the phone in public.
Mugging is bad enough but mistreating girls/women like this is despicable. Very primitive.
People should take care of not using cell phones on public/insecure places. I have observed many girls (and guys) talking on phone while crossing road or waiting for bus. If there is something urgent you have to communicate, better use a hands-free.
Lolz, don’t get me wrong but I am helpless. I had to laugh. This is so funny. Nothing new in snatching but surely a new strategy.
despicable crime. despicably done.
Yeah good advice by Kashif: if you have to use a cell phone in public, get urself some handsfree speakers.
btw: whatever happened to that phone locking thing the govt was trying to implement? all gone down the drain?
I think Karachi is fast becoming a lucrative for Mace and Stun Guns and other such products that are typically used by women to defend themselves. Id love to watch the response of cell phone snatchers when they get jolted by a stun gun.
Swa, I believe that cell phone locking system only increased the number of phone thefts. Since stolen phones are not easily sold in the market now, and the number of buyers has decreased (only a person who has a connection to export the cell phones to other cities of Pakistan will buy these phones now), therefore thieves who ‘earned’ ‘X’ on each phone stolen and then sold, are now making ‘X/2’ because of the decrease in demand. But since the needs of the thieves have not changed significantly, they are working harder than before and stealing more than they did before the phone blocking system was implemented. But the government is not to be blamed, its inevitable. lol
Solution:
Apply Islamic punishment. Cut off the hands of 10 criminals and save 50,000 people from losing their cell phones. Good bargain.
Not sure why talking in public in not a good idea unless you are crossing the road or driving. Its mugging that is the problem not talking in public.
its better to avoid talking in public because ‘prevention is better than cure’!!
Again why don’t they start catching these muggers like they do in other countries? This would make mugging a rarity.
Yahya, mugging is not a ‘rarity’ in any big city of the world.
Well I guess rarity is a relative word but in London people do casually use phone in public and there aren’t many case of this sort of snatching for people to worry too much. Why can’t we replicate this feeling in Pakistan with proactive policing? Let’s face it, authorities over there are not good at their job.
@ Kumail: you are right, i wonder why pepper spray isnt sold in Pakistan yet. Theres so much petty crime against women, if they carried pepper spray or somethign such, they would be considerably safer.
Yahya, 1 in 3 is a victim of street crime in the UK. Low crime concentration areas in London are those where they have CCTv cameras. Try walking an empty park in London in the night and you will feel the same way about the ‘PROACTIVE POLICING’ in London.
i read this report in dawn quite some time back. here i thought that karachi metblogs was with the times. sad..
“Walking an empty park in London in the night” is hardly a common public activity. Let’s not compare apples and oranges.
Yahya, thats right. Lets not compare apples & oranges. If I remember correctly London’s GDP alone surpasses ¬£ 125 Billion . So kindly stop comparing London with Karachi.
what is the purpose of cellphone if you cannot use it in public…. at home u can use landline…
Cell phones for mobility not public exhibition.
Most of my friends have not had a cell phone snatching happen to them, probably because they are smart.
Whats the use of your brain if you cant use it? lol
sorry I meant whats the purpose of your brain…
Wow This post is amazing…… Not only because of the topic but also cause of the kind of replies…
1) Many people seems to find humiliating (beating) a girl (our sister) in Pakistan FUNNY.
2) Many here are suggesting NOT to use cell phones in public.
…Instead of showing some dignity and sense to take action against such crimes.
3) They think comparing a small developed city (London) with developing city (Karachi) is not right.
If some day we have to become a developed nation, we have to start thinking like one today. We must fix our characters. Even if the guy was her brother, even then he committed a crime (by slapping) but amazingly people didnt do anything. The girl & the society is responsible for this act for NOT taking any immediate action. The city MUST NEVER surrender to such crimes if they want to give their kids a safer tomorrow. They must openly reject not only cell phone snatching but more importantly hitting a woman in public. The women also need to show some leadership. Wake up people.
Sufi, you like to argue but you don’t like to loose. You just switched your argument because previous line of argument did not go your way. What good is 125 Billion to a “phokat” on a London street who is same as a phokat in Karachi and both need to get some money somehow? Effective policing will deter both from easy shortcuts like mugging and encourage taking slightly harder albeit legitimate work.
rickshaw:
2. what possible action do you want to take? these people are armed & dangerous, and do not care if you live or not. if you resist, you will be shot/stabbed.
3. well. karachi & london cannot possibly be put in the same basket. they both are big cities & thats about it. not saying anyone of them is better. its like comparing reema with angelina jolie. i like them both, but they have no comparison :p
the city must never surrender: I am assuming you do not live in Karachi. If you do live here, do not TRY RESISTING to street crime or the loss might be irreplaceable (khuda na khaasta)
Yahya I should have made it clearer, I am sorry. When I say the GDP of London crosses £ 125 Billion I mean that they have means to afford cctv (even though the cost of operation is so high there) and have policing units patrol in small units. But still the street crime rate is 33 %. One in every 3 has been a victim of street crime in the UK.
I am not responding to you in this post after this.
Cheers
@Raheel:
Well the hope is that one day your mother, daughter, wife or sister gets slapped like this and then we can all laugh. Thanks for brining up the funny side, we could not have seen it otherwise.
mansoor!! cooked in microwave?
About time they fulfilled their promise of cell-phone-fitted-in-the-tooth! :-D
damn the slow progress of nanotech :(
yahya: who said cellphone snatching is not a problem in london??
Just a couple of sites for you to feast your eyes on…
from btp.police.uk
Mobile phone theft now accounts for around 45% of theft from the person reported on the London Underground.
from lboro.ac.uk
New research by the Midlands Centre for Criminology and Criminal Justice at Loughborough University has identified a mobile phone ‘Top Ten’ hit list, and urges consumers and the mobile phone industry to increase their anti-theft efforts.
Happy?
Karachi is fast becoming a lucrative for Mace and Stun Guns
Yeah,even there is no Second Amendment!
its like comparing reema with angelina jolie.
Laholwalaquat!
Mansoor: 45% and top ten are just indicative of their portion in the total crime. Overall this problem is not too great to warrant fear in general public use. There may be some places and especially late at night but these are exceptions. Reason is simple. System here works (for most part). There are plenty of cameras but cameras are cheap these days and any city can have them in some numbers especially at places of most trouble. Then there is police in plain dress/cars that roam the streets and at any sign of trouble they try to grab the perpetrator and bring to justice. As long as there is fear of system such problems remain exceptional.
The system is also continuously reviewed to see problem areas/loopholes. There was a problem with teenagers snatching mobiles until a couple of years ago as they could not be prosecuted severally due to age but then government changed the rules and now they are prosecuted as adults and since then the problem has gone down quite a bit.
Point is that to solve this or any other problem you need to do something about it rather than just sit on it.
This London/Karachi mobile phone comparison thing is getting boring. Point is whoever makes effort to curb this and other problems will be better off and we can use experience from other cities of the world to help solve our problems.
Of course if there is no need to improve law enforcement in Karachi, great. :)
hey why dont any one of you try to experiment himself/herself resisting the mobile phone snatchers who are armed and always ready to pull the trigger?
Is this only me who thinks that those guys were too smart? You have to appreciate their creativity. It was real smart way of snatiching, I like it.
By the way why does every argument here becomes so sexist, the important thing was slap, not a gal. You could use method on guys too and I am sure most of them would be shocked too. I am loving the way. Quite innovative and creative.
I feel sorry for the girl..but the whole incident sounds like as we used to joke in our school days
it brought so many funny memories of my school days.
I challenge the sons & daughters of Karachi not to give up on this city. Dont surrender to such crimes. Fight….This is true Jihad….where is our Jihad now?
To the ones who commit such crimes: You are the enemy of Islam and enemy of Pakistan. We will fight you and we will win.
Why doesn’t MMA go for a Long March on Mobile snatching?
@Rick Shaw:
Gir gaai sajda maiN jub waqte qayyam aya. :)
yahya: yea.. its gettin boring..
abdul sami: cuz the MMA will loose their mobile phones while marching :D lolz
annie: it does sound more like a prank…. but somewhere along the way, the lines between prank and reality got dimmed out.. :S
The slap is zordaar. I hope the dude got paid enough. :)
Sorry last post in wrong thread.
@Topic
Slapping a Girl – that too In Public – !
next – snatching a cellphone,
In Totality it is a commentless situation, !
i like friend ship
“i like friend ship”
Me to, but not with you. :)
lol @ abdulrehman :D
frandshippers dont miss anyplace do they :D