Rs 8-crore robbery at Muthoot

Cops interact with branch manager of Muthoot Finance.

Abhijeet Chatterjee, TT,  Dec 23, 2017, Asansol: An armed gang of seven looted cash and gold worth Rs 8.5 crore from a Muthoot Finance branch in Asansol on Saturday morning and took away the hard disc of the CCTV, leaving investigators groping for clues.

"It appears a professional job. In the absence of CCTV footage, we are facing problems in investigations," a police officer said about the robbery being described as the biggest in the area in the past few years.

In a similar strike four years ago, cash and gold worth Rs 14 crore had been looted from Muthoot's office in Durgapur's Benachity, 45km away, but the police had arrested the gang members from Jharkhand and recovered a portion of the booty.

In Calcutta and its vicinity, robbers have struck thrice at Muthoot offices - including one on Park Street - over the past year, taking away Rs 14 crore in all.

In Asansol on Saturday, the gang of seven wearing monkey caps and helmets entered the branch of the Kerala-based gold finance firm at Court More - one of the busiest areas in the town - a little after it opened at 9.30am.

Brandishing revolvers, the seven, speaking in Hindi, pushed aside the employees, including security guard Abhijit Das and manager Papri Basu Nayak, as they stormed the branch on the first floor of a building that also houses a pathology lab and a jewellery shop.

Later, three of the robbers went outside and stood guard while their accomplices inside demanded the keys to the vault from cashier Surodip Konar at gunpoint. "They forced us to enter the toilet after snatching our cellphones and locked us up," said Chandan Giri, the accountant.

The goons opened the vault and stuffed 28kg of gold ornaments and Rs 4 lakh in cash in three bags, taking around 40 minutes to grab and pack the valuables.

The employees locked up inside the toilet broke open the door half-an-hour after the gang had left, coming out on the street and raising the alarm.

Although the hard disc of the CCTV was taken away, the police later found footage from cameras of the pathology lab on the ground floor.

"None of the goons could be identified as their faces were covered. We saw them (in the pathology footage) taking away the bags in which they stuffed the gold ornaments and the cash. They fled on three motorcycles," said another police officer.

Muthoot issued a release later saying its "top most priority is to safeguard the interest of customers" and reassuring them that they will not face losses as "the stolen gold is insured". The branch is closed for now but will reopen soon, it added.

Police commissioner L.N. Meena said all police stations, including those in neighbouring Jharkhand, have been alerted to track down the gang.