Chennai: 2 men arrested in Fedbank heist, prime accused at large

CHENNAI: A day after five men decamped with Rs 20 crore worth of gold and cash from the Arumbakkam branch of Fedbank Financial Services Limited - a non-banking financial firm - police on Sunday arrested two people in connection with the heist.
According to a statement from the arrested men - V Balaji, 30 and M Santhosh - who were picked up on GNT Road in Red Hills, they long with prime accused Murugan, Shakthivel and Suryah reached the spot on two motorcycles and offered a sedative-laced soft drink to security guard Saravanan who was sitting outside the bank.
After he fell unconscious, they entered and locked up branch manager K Suresh, 30, of Batlagundu, and customer service executive R Vijayalakshmi, 36, of KK Nagar, at knifepoint before completing the operation.
Police have seized from the crime spot the CCTV camera footage showing Murugan and others arriving by bike. The gang packed the jewellery in three bags.
Police said Murugan, the 32-year-old mastermind, had been working at the bank's Virugambakkam branch for two-and-half-years and over the last two months had been posted at the Padi branch.
Police said Balaji was the one who arranged a car for Murugan to escape. With the help of the registration number provided by him, police alerted all the check posts and are questioning Balaji and Santhosh to know how they operated.
Of the 32kg gold stolen, police have seized 18kg from the arrested men. The gang members, a police officer said, had split the booty among themselves to make it easier for them to take to different places.
Police are also checking the CCTV camera footage and FasTag details at toll gates.
Six special teams have been formed for the purpose and have been fanned out to various places as the accused are likely to have escaped to Bengaluru, Kolkata and Andhra Pradesh.