Repeated incidents of ATM breake-ins have posed serious concern for the banks as well as the security agencies.
The latest incident occurred in Bahanaga under Soro police station limits, which came to the knowledge after a local found a complete unit of the ATM unit lying beside NH-16 on Thursday morning.
The circumstantial evidences showed that the ATM was dislodged from its base by the miscreants and was ferried by tying with a rope.
After the rope snapped they fled from the spot abandoning the machine on road. However, the fortunate part is that the goons failed to take away the cash which was stacked inside the chamber.
Sources said cash of Rs 21 lakh was found intact when verification was made by the bank officials. Following report of such incident, SP B Jugal Kishor and other senior police officials rushed to the site along with a scientific team near Bahanaga public health center (PHC).
Although sniffer dog was pressed in service yet it failed to provide much lead. The police, besides apprehending local people’s hand, also suspected that at least 4-5 persons were involved in the crime. Before committing the burglary, they had snapped the CCTV connections.
Soro police station IIC Dillip Sahu said, “The kiosk is a franchise unit of SBI managed by a private company .The cash is intact. It appears that about 4-5 persons are involved in the crime. They attempted to carry the unit by dragging, may be by using a tractor, after dislodging it from its base.”
“Involvement of the local miscreants is not ruled out. Although the footage during the crime is not available as the connections were severed, yet previous recordings are analyzed. A case under Section 457(trespassing) and 380/511(abortive attempt to commit burglary) of IPC has been registered .The investigation is in progress,” he said.