Our police is equipped to do so.But lazy enough not to bother.If you have some contacts in police,it will be easy.
My cousin worked in aircel.He told me how the procedure works.Police blacklist an IMEI to all service providers.All calls through the service provider are associated with IMEI of the phone through which call has been made.So police can easily get the details of the person using the phone.
If you get the address of the thief,pay a policeman few bucks and take him to the thiefs house.He will get scared and return the phone.

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I think its much better than useless trips to the police station