Overview
- In a coordinated New Year drive, Madhya Pradesh Police recovered more than 525 lost and stolen mobiles, including 251 in Chhindwara, 154 in Bhopal’s Zone-04, 111 in Narsinghpur, and arrests with nine phones seized in Betul.
- Official 2025 figures show 151,104 mobile complaints statewide, with 100,488 devices traced and 34,818 recovered for a recovery rate of 34.66 percent.
- Bhopal’s performance lagged sharply, with only about 12 percent of reported phones recovered in 2025, highlighting persistent enforcement gaps despite technical tracing.
- Police investigations report that many Bhopal thefts feed networks that route devices through Indian hubs before trafficking them to Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka, limiting prospects for recovery.
- Separately, Khanna police returned 83 recovered phones to owners after recent drives, though local data show more than 3,000 reported devices from the past year remain untraced.