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Rs 65 lakh looted from Jalandhar bank Jalandhar, November 10 The robbers struck at 3.10 p.m. and looted cash from the bank security vault and from the desk of the head cashier after overpowering the bank’s security guard. They also snatched money from customers who had come to the bank to deposit cash. Bank officials, initially said that more than Rs 90 lakh was looted from the bank, besides the cash taken away from about 25 customers. However, a check of the bank’s deposit by late evening revealed that the bank had lost Rs 63.20 lakh, while Rs 1.56 lakh had been looted from a customer. The whole operation lasted for about half an hour. No one was hurt. Bank officials did not raise any alarm at the time of the robbery. Exactly a month ago, on October 10, three armed men had looted Rs 4.4 lakh from the Bholath Road branch of Punjab National Bank in Kapurthala district. No breakthrough has been achieved in this case so far. According to eye-witnesses, three tall turbaned men, armed with pistols, entered the bank and overpowered the bank’s security guard, Mr Malkeet Singh. Mr Malkeet Singh said he suffered minor injuries on his hand while trying to resist the robbers. He said one of the three was in his early twenties. The second one was aged around 40 and the third was in his late twenties. He said the 40- year -old hit him and snatched his gun from him. He said the robbers kept saying to the employees that they held nothing against them but had an “enmity with the government.” The robbers took the employees in the adjoining hall and asked them to lift their arms before locking some 35 to 40 persons, including bank employees and the customers of the bank, in the bank’s strongroom. They struck the head cashier SM Verma’s desk and emptied the strong room of the bank. The robbers picked up packets of currency higher than the denomination of Rs 50. “They tied the cash in a ‘patka’ and carried it in a black bag,” he added. The robbers had pistols in their hands, added Mr Chawla. The faces of the robbers were covered. “We sounded the siren of the bank 10 minutes after the robbers had decamped,” he said. Satish Kumar had come to the bank as usual to deposit cash in the account of the local petrol pump where he works. A visibly shaken Satish said, “One of the robbers snatched the bag I was carrying after putting a gun on the back of my head and hurled the employees and the customers inside the office of the bank and locked them from outside. We remained locked for one hour. I had Rs 1.56 lakh in cash in a bag I was carrying. This was the daily cash collections of the petrol pump.” The SHO, Mr Gurmeet Singh, said he reached the spot on a phone call from the control room “within minutes”. He said, “On reaching the bank, I opened the door of the bank office and took the employees out.” The SSP, Mr Ishwar Singh, said nakas had been put up at all points leading out of the city. Rohit from the Basti Sheikh area came to the bank branch at about 3.45 pm and found that all employees were “absent”. “None of the employees of the bank were at their desks and bundles of Rs 5 notes were lying scattered all around. Rohit said he heard a loud knocking sound from within the bank’s premises and realised that something grave had happened. He informed the police using his mobile phone.  |
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