KARACHI: In the first bank heist of the new year, around half a dozen robbers stormed into a private bank branch in the busy Punjab Chowrangi area on Thursday morning and took away more than Rs1.2 million and an official handgun, police said.

They added that the bank guards did not put up any resistance and the bank management was also found ignoring directions of the central bank about preventing robberies, which prompted the police authorities to initiate a probe into the incident, while the chief minister suspended the station house officer of Gizri.

The suspects arrived at Dubai Islamic Bank near Punjab Chowrangi in the Gizri police limits at around 9:22am. They overpowered a guard posted outside while inside the bank they held another guard at gunpoint and took away Rs1.2 million from the strongroom of the branch. The fleeing suspects also took away a pistol snatched from the guard, said SSP South Saqib Ismail Memon.

He said the investigators had obtained footage of a CCTV camera installed there and they were working to identify and bring the suspects to justice.

The SSP said that as per the bank management’s claim, they pushed the alarm button but the system was probably not functioning.

He said they were investigating to ascertain if the private bank management had followed the prescribed standard operating procedure (SOP) of the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) to prevent such incidents. He said if it was proved that the SOP was not followed, the police would bring it to the notice of the SBP authorities.

The SSP said both guards were not properly trained. One guard told the police that he had fired only two shots in his life. He revealed that initially the bank management told the police that the robbers took away Rs2m, but later it transpired that the exact amount looted was Rs1,265,659.

Karachi South DIG Azad Khan visited the crime scene, where he told the media that initial inquiries showed that the bank’s strongroom, where the cash was kept, was open. The bank management admitted that it was open, but added this was “because the cash van had brought money just before the robbery”.

Besides, Azad Khan said initial inquiries suggested that the bank management did not follow the SBP SOP. He said that legal action might be taken against the bank management after the investigation.

Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah, who also holds the portfolio of home affairs, took “immediate serious notice” of the bank robbery and sought a report from the inspector general of police A.D. Khowaja, said a CM House spokesperson.

The chief minister also suspended the area SHO for demonstrating “irresponsibility”, he added.

Mr Shah also told the IG that he “will not tolerate street crimes in the metropolis”.

Leader of the opposition in the Sindh Assembly Khwaja Izharul Hassan had demanded on Wednesday that a full-time home minister be appointed, claiming that the crime rate in the city was increasing as the chief minister was running the ministry ‘through the media’ .

‘Bankers may face abetment charges’

Additional Inspector General of Police Karachi Mushtaq Ahmed Mahar said on Thursday that police were contemplating to book bank officials in bank robbery cases on “abetment charges” as the banks were apparently not following the SBP SOP pertaining to the establishment of bunkers and installation of CCTV cameras and alarm system at the banks.

Responding to media queries and speaking at the inauguration of a CPLC office and child and women protection unit in Lyari, the city police chief said “ultimately, we have to move towards this (lodging cases against bankers)”.

Published in Dawn, January 20th, 2017