HARIPUR, Nov 5: Three bandits, who were travelling in a Lahore-bound coach, robbed passengers of their cash and valuables on Tuesday night near Dhaiden village on the GT Road in the jurisdiction of Kot Najibullah police station.

According to the FIR registered on the complaint of one of the passengers and the driver the cash looted was said to be Rs401,500.

Faisal Mehmood, the driver of coach No 3700 PRJ, told the police that as they reached near Dhaiden village some six kilometres from here at around 11 pm, a man sitting in the front seat held him at gunpoint and asked him to take the vehicle to a nearby link road, while his two accomplices held the passengers hostage at gunpoint.

The bandits looted all the passengers, except women, for about two hours and made off with a large amount of money.

Mohammed Aslam of Abbottabad, who runs a crockery shop in the city, was alone robbed of Rs401,500 while loss of other passengers was not known, as according to the police the other passengers did not lodge FIR about their loss.

A police source said that the police had also recovered Rs95,000 and Rs16,000 from the bushes, which was somehow thrown out of the vehicle’s window by two passengers.