Daily Times

KARACHI: A group comprising on as many as five robbers have looted more than half a million of rupees from a private bank in Kharadar Cloth market on Wednesday and managed to flee along with the guard’s weapon, in the eight bank heist of the year and the second within just twenty hours.

Investigation units of Sindh police like Specialised Investigation Unit (SIU) and Counter Terrorism Department (CTD) have completely failed to trace the culprits to curb the increasingly bank robberies in biggest metropolitan city despite being highly equipped and having huge financial incentives comparing to District police.

According to reports, the robbers entered the bank with their faces covered with masks and helmets and walked away with huge amount easily.

SHO Kharadar Zafar Iqbal has informed that at 0959 hours, 05 unknown armed robbers entered into Bank Al Baraka Kharadar Branch and committed robbery of cash Rs. 6/7 Lacs and also snatched pistol of private guard and escaped. CCTV cameras stayed safe while the accused fled away from the spot.

It is pertinent to mention that bank robberies were on rise before Karachi operation was initiated in 2013 now again that trend has suddenly surfaced.

SIU which has been run by SSP Farooq Awan during last few years was supposed to probe into these incidents as this unit is specially tasked with the duty to investigate bank robberies.

Performance of police has remained at its lowest as the Chief Minister has also expressed his displeasure over the bank robbery and demanded an immediate report from Additional IG Karachi. He questioned the police to inform him about the group behind the bank robberies.

Shah has also reportedly to have inquired that why police have chosen to remain silent over the unfortunate developments and questioned what is the intelligence network doing in the city?

The chief minister has also demanded security details of all banks and markets in the metropolis.

On Tuesday, the branch manager of a private bank was shot dead by robbers in Karachi’s Tariq Road vicinity. Abdul Rahim Motiwala, 40, was shot in the head twice after he attempted to stop the four robbers as they left the branch after looting nearly Rs 0.65 million rupees in cash.

Published in Daily Times, August 10^th 2017.