Rs 4.68 lakh looted from bank in Muzaffarpur, second incident within six days

PATNA: At least four bike-borne armed men looted Rs 4.68 lakh from Central Bank of India’s branch located at Garha Chowk under Ahiyapur police station area of Muzaffarpur on Wednesday.
This is second incident of bank loot in Muzaffarpur within six days. On January 8, at least five criminals had looted Rs 17.09 lakh from Bandhan Bank located at market area of Donawa under Sakra police station in Muzaffarpur after injuring a roadside vendor.However, STF had recovered Rs 16.71 lakh out of Rs 17.09 lakh after nabbing four criminals from Kankarbagh in Patna within 12 hours.
On January 7, four armed criminals had barged inside Punjab National Bank’s Bakhri branch in Begusarai at around 4.30pm but they failed to loot even a single penny. An FIR was lodged in connection with the loot attempt with Bakhri police station next day by the bank manager.
Speaking on Wednesday’s loot incident, Muzaffarpur SSP Jayant Kant told TOI over phone that the criminals had barged inside bank at around 10.30am and decamped with the money within next few minutes.
“Raids were going on at suspected hideouts. Police are trying to ascertained their identity,” he said.
Ahiyapur police station SHO Sunil Rajak said that the criminals took the bank employees and customers present inside branch hostage on gunpoint during the loot.
“There were four bank employees and around six customers inside a branch when the incident took place,” Rajak said.
He said that the criminals coerced the bank authorities to open the vault too which they obeyed but not much cash was inside the branch that time.
“Altogether Rs 4.68 lakh was looted. Some of the criminals were covering their face using muffler and caps. No firing took place during the incident,” he said.
SHO said that the criminals also collected cellphones of all the bank employees and customers before fleeing and took them away so that none could immediately contact police or anyone else to inform about the loot. Rajak said that further investigation was going on in connection with the loot.