The President of Karnataka Film Chamber of Commerce has an investigation on hand. Apparently, about three-four months ago there was a theft at the Chamber when 72 silver mementos worth `35,000 were stolen. The Chamber is only now taking help of the police to investigate the matter. Clarifying about the issue, President B Vijay Kumar, said, “First of all, let me clear the air. Many are under the impression that silver plates were stolen, but it was small mementos made in silver that are missing. These were purchased during the Platinum Jubilee celebrations of the Kannada Industry. The stock was kept under lock and key but has disappeared now,” said VijayKumar.
The President also revealed that the incident occurred around the time of Chamber elections. “The Chamber was crowded during election time as we had hundreds of people coming in and going out. We had utilised the room at that time and somebody has taken advantage. We have around 16 staff members who have been working for nearly 25 years now. One thing can be assured that they wouldn’t have done this.”
Vijaykumar who was keen on sorting out the matter within the chamber had to give up on the request of his associates and senior colleagues. “It is now a question of the Chamber’s prestige. I will be discussing the matter with other associates on Monday and will file a complaint and hand over the case to the police. I don’t want to delay it any further and don’t want to lose respect as this case has come up in my tenure,” he said.
Has this prompted the Chamber to take any precautions or have they made any security arrangements? “We don’t have jewellery or valuable records. We just have documents and computers that are safely stored. This happened out of negligence. It needs to be investigated further,” he concluded.