TURA: The West Garo Hills police acted fast and showed exemplary co-ordination on Tuesday that led to the recovery of Rs 25 lakh stolen from Richard HM Marak, an employee of State Bank of India here and arrest of the miscreants.
The incident occurred around 11:15am. The employee of Gambegre branch of SBI withdrew Rs 25 lakh from the main branch located near the offices of the deputy commissioner and the police superintendent. He was carrying the money in two bags.
When he went near his car, parked around 100meters away from the bank, he found a flat tyre. So he put the bags inside the vehicle and got busy in changing the tyre. After sometime he noticed that the bags were missing.
He alerted police and information soon began to flow in about two persons on a black bike spotted near a local market carrying two bags similar to the description given by the SBI employee.
Tura police swung into action and set up road blocks and vehicle checking at all entry and exit points of the town. “We also alerted all police stations in nearby state of Assam and out technical team was also pressed into service,” said district SP MGR Kumar.
The search led police to the plain belt town of Phulbari where they found that the thieves had boarded a boat and were heading to Dhubri in Assam.
The boat was around 2 km into its journey on the Jinjiram river when police alerted the boatman and ordered to stop the engine. A police team boarded the boat and arrested the duo and seized the cash and their two-wheeler.
One of the arrested persons has been identified as Anurag Singh (27) of Islampur in West Bengal while the other is a juvenile.
Police are probing further to ascertain the other members of the gang to establish their modus operandi.
The team work of the West Garo Hills police was hailed by the banking fraternity with the AGM of the SBI issuing a congratulatory note to the police.
However, questions have been raised about why standard operating procedure, of having security personnel, was not followed either by the bank or the employee while withdrawing a large sum of money.
