A shop owner looted 2 banks in Bhubaneswar with a toy gun to pay off his loans, as he suffered severe losses due to the Coronavirus lockdown.
(Picture - Representational Purpose)
Bitter, frustrated and angered by the losses he incurred during the lockdown, a 25-year-old man in Odisha, who owns a ready made clothing shop, robbed 2 banks of 12 lakhs with a toy gun in Bhubaneswar.
The man, identified as Soumyaranjan Jena, learnt bank robbing techniques on YouTube and finally put the skills to test by looting Indian Overseas Bank and Bank of India, in which he holds accounts and had also taken loans for his business.
The shop owner is now arrested and in police custody and Commissioner Sudhansu Sarangi confirmed after an inquiry that the man robbed the banks to pay off his loans as his business suffered tremendously during the Covid-19 lockdown.
It is reported that the accused, who had accounts in both the banks had taken a loan of 19 lakhs to run his shop, which sells sarees, shoes, fancy jewellery and other items and before the lockdown had a monthly turnover of around 9 lakhs but got severely hit since March and was unable to repay the loans.
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After looting both the banks, the accused managed to repay some of his loans and kept the rest for himself. After a police raid of his residence, 10 lakh in cash, toy guns and a vehicle have been recovered from the accused.
“He had looted nearly Rs 12 lakh from the Indian Overseas Bank, near Infocity area on September 7, and the Bank of India’s Barimunda branch in Mancheswar area on September 28. He got the idea of watching YouTube videos and used a toy gun to rob the two banks,” said the police commissioner.
Surprisingly, right after the lockdown was announced in March, Odisha has seen a number of bank robberies and ATM thefts, and most of the reasons are financial loss, job loss and a need to feed their family.
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