KARACHI • At least 47 people have been killed and 118 wounded resisting attempts to snatch cellphones at gunpoint in Karachi during the first six months of the current year, figures compiled from newspaper reports show.

This shows a staggering rise of 19.3 per cent in such incidents if the figures are compared with those of the last six months of the previous year.

At least 26,491 mobile phones have either been snatched or reported stolen/missing from different parts of the city during the January-June period this year. This compares to the figure of 22,203 cellphones taken away during the July-December period last year, according to the Citizens-Police Liaison Committee record.

At least 9,051 cellphones were snatched at gunpoint during the period January-June 2006 whereas 14,836 cellphones were reported stolen and 2,604 reported missing in this period, the data shows.

The statistics show a throughout higher proportion of cell phone theft rather than snatchings incidents, suggesting that a sizable number of the cellphones are being stolen in the city.

However, there are no official figures available with the police department and CPLC pertaining to casualties during the cell phone-related robberies, inquires show.

A spokesman for the police department maintained: “We have data of the snatched or stolen cellphones, but we don’t have the data of the mobile phone-related killings. a separate data of such deaths are not maintained as these fatalities are regarded as murder and the figures are fed under the head of general murders.”

The month of May witnessed the highest number of cell phone snatching or theft with the figure shooting up to 4,791. The data puts Gulshan-i-Iqbal on top of the high risk areas viz-a-viz the cellphone snatching and theft during the period July 1, 2005 to June 30, 2006, with the reported figure being 2,660. It is followed by Preedy with 2,027, Korangi with 1,593, Ferozabad with 1,481 and Gulistan-i-Jauhar with 1,402.

In most cases of mobile phone snatching or theft, the victim is deprived of some cash or valuable also.

However, when a complainant goes to the police station to lodge an FIR in a cellphone-related case, police would make no mention of the other things lost by the victim in the FIR. Similarly, police would advise most complainants to lodge a theft report even if they were deprived of their mobile phone at gunpoint.