HYDERABAD: A Rangers man was shot dead and a private security guard wounded during a bank robbery here on Monday.

Two robbers entered the Allied Bank Hirabad branch at 9.40am and after a couple of minutes gunshots were heard outside before their three accomplices joined them, according to branch manager Fateh Mohammad Mughal.

The five armed men then held the staff at gunpoint and collected money from the counter, he added. Later, the snatched amount was estimated at Rs1.98 million.

Eyewitnesses and officials at the Market police station said that three armed men first snatched the official Kalashnikov assault rifle held by police Head Constable Ikramuddin, standing outside the bank.

A private security guard, Faisal Shah, present close to him tried to stop them but the robbers fired at him and snatched his 30-bore pistol.

The guard sustained bullet wounds in the firing, they said.

Mr Mughal told Dawn that while the robbers were still busy collecting the money, one of them alerted his accomplices about the arrival of Rangers personnel outside.

All of them rushed back to the main gate and fired shots at Rangers men, who returned fire, he said, adding that one of the Rangers men, Lance Naik Ghulam Asghar, 42, son of Ali Nawaz Hajano, sustained bullet wounds and was rushed to the Liaquat University Hospital, where he died during treatment.

The robbers fled on foot leaving behind their two motorcycles, the police said. Some of the eyewitnesses put the number of robbers involved in the bank heist at up to eight, saying that five of them entered the branch and the others stayed outside during the whole episode.

Hyderabad SP Umer Tufail told the media in the evening that the weapons snatched from the head constable and security guard were found in a street adjoining the bank branch.

The Market police had not registered the case till late in the evening.

Published in Dawn, October 21st, 2014