26 lockers looted in Kanpur bank heist
KANPUR: Unidentified masked miscreants broke into the Union Bank of India’s (UBI) Pashupati Nagar branch in Kanpur and emptied 26 lockers, which contained jewellery, cash and documents, police said on Monday.
While the exact amount of the property burgled was being assessed, it could be worth several crores, customers and bank officials said. A transporter, Ashutosh Gupta, said the burglars made away with all his family jewellery worth ₹1 crore.
Taking a serious view of the incident, Akhilesh Kumar, SSP Kanpur, suspended station officer, Naubasta police station, Akhilesh Jaiswal for alleged negligence. The UP police’s Special Task Force (STF) will assist the Kanpur police in probing the case, the SSP said.
As news spread about the burglary, customers thronged the bank and held a protest, demanding compensation for their losses. Alok Singh, inspector general of police for the Kanpur zone, said the case would be cracked soon.
The bank is situated on the ground floor of a private house . The burglary was discovered when Mahesh Kumar, a bank employee, opened the bank in the morning.
“When I entered, the locker room lock was broken, and on going further, I found several lockers broken open,” the bank employee said. He informed bank manager Praveen Srivastava, who informed police.
The police, on examining the CCTV footage, found a man wearing a mask entering the bank and smashing CCTV cameras.
The burglars entered the bank from the adjacent vacant plot, making a hole in the wall. They had brought with them a gas cutter, which they used to break open the locker room and the lockers.
Srivastava said the burglers even tried to enter the strong room but could not succeed.
The forensic team has picked up some leads from the crime scene but the sniffer dog could not provide any clue, police said. Bank officials said the items kept in lockers were not disclosed to the bank and it was difficult for them to immediately ascertain their exact worth.