An entire diesel engine was stolen part by part from a railway yard in Bihar's Begusarai district, police said on Friday.
The thieves dug a tunnel to the yard and started stealing parts, slowly doing away with the entire engine that was brought there for repairs, they said.
"Last week, a case was registered at the Barauni police station for the theft of a diesel engine brought for repairs to the Garhara yard. In the course of the investigation, three people were arrested," said P.S. Dubey, Inspector of the Railway Protection Force (RPF), Muzaffarpur.
Based on the information given by them during interrogation, searches were conducted at a scrap godown in the Prabhat Nagar area of Muzaffarpur district and 13 sacks full of train parts were found, he said.
A search was on for the owner of the scrap godown, Mr. Dubey added.
Recovered items include engine parts, wheels of vintage train engines and railway parts made of heavy iron.
"They had dug a tunnel to the railway yard and through it, they used to carry the locomotive parts and other items in sacks," said Mr. Dubey.
The gang was also involved in unbolting steel bridges and stealing their parts, he said.
Last year, a railway engineer of the Samastipur loco diesel shed was suspended after he allegedly sold off an old steam engine kept on the Purnea court premises.
The engineer had allegedly used a forged letter of the divisional mechanical engineer of Samastipur to sell the engine in connivance with other railway officials and security personnel.
