Kalaburagi: Muthoot Fincorp employees had opened the door on Wednesday as usual. But, very little did they know that they were about to witness and experience a Bollywood-style heist right in front of their eyes.
In second heist in Kalaburagi district in the last two months, after January 12 dacoity that took place at an ATM at Gabbur in Afzalpur taluk where looters fled with Rs 25 lakh, in the Muthoot Fincorp heist, the miscreants fled with gold worth Rs 3 cr and Rs 3 lac in cash.
At 11 am, four men claiming to be government inspectors walked into the company’s Jayanagar branch on the Gulbarga University Main Road, barged into the chamber of the Branch Manager and demanded to inspect documents.
Soon, one of them brandished knife at an employee and directed every employee to hand over their phones and march towards strong room.
A petrified employee, acting as per the orders from the four opened the door of the strongroom.
In just 15 minutes, the gang allegedly took away 12 kg in gold ornaments, which the company estimates at Rs 3.18 crore, and Rs 3 lakh in cash. They locked the vault from outside and escaped, said the complaint.
Though none of the employees were assaulted or injured, they remained scared as one of the employee was under their knife.
A few minutes later, a customer came in, and using his mobile, the staff called the police control room.
Amit Singh, Superintendent of Police, said the police had received information about the heist at 12 pm. “We are stopping and checking vehicles across the district,” The New Indian Express quoted Singh.
Shivakumar, North-East Range IGP, said the gang was communicating in the Kannada dialect spoken in the region and experts are looking into the CCTV footage.
Shivakumar also said the alarm was not working and the company’s security was not up to the mark.
Another branch of Muthoot Fincorp, at Nehru Gunj in Kalaburagi, was looted of Rs 1.52 crore on November 16, 2013. No one has been arrested for that crime.
