BENGALURU: The shocking discovery of a member who was found misusing his lockers at Bowring Club could cause a change in locker usage policy at other clubs.
Even if several clubs are confident their lockers cannot be misused in the same way due to some safeguards that have been put in place, they could consider tightening up the system.
On Saturday, it emerged that Avinash Amarlal Kukreja, a member of Bowring Club since 1993, had stashed assets in three lockers at the club. Property documents estimated to be worth over Rs 800 crore, cash and jewellery worth several crores and two expensive watches were seized from the lockers.
Arjun Anekar, honorary president of Century Club, said it was likely that the incident would bring about a change in the club’s rules.
“We will hold a meeting soon and will consider having a duplicate key for every locker at the club’s office, apart from one with the member. Until now, only members would possess keys to their lockers. The committee concerned will decide, but I think this measure will be brought in,” he said.
CEO of Bangalore Turf Club Harimohan Naidu said the issue was to be discussed in a committee meeting on Monday, and changes in locker usage could be brought in. As of now, only jockeys are provided lockers at the club, not the members and the keys to the lockers are only with the jockeys.
Some clubs, such as Eagleton Golf Resort near Bidadi, are confident that their current system is good enough to discourage any member from misusing the lockers. General Manager of the club Mathew GP said there are two kinds of lockers at the club. The first are safety deposits that only room resident members can use, for which declarations are taken from members, stating the safe would not be used to store anything illegal. The club too has a key to the locker and it can only be opened by keys from both the club and the owner, he said.
The second kind of lockers are at washrooms.
“The Bowring incident has made me think about these lockers, but it is not needed. So no change in any arrangements will be made,” Mathew said.
Harish Shetty, president, Karnataka Golf Association, said the club provided only wooden lockers, and hence it was unthinkable for anyone to keep valuables in them.
“But we might possibly bring in an extra security measure,” he said.
Indiranagar Club claims to already have a foolproof system to prevent misuse of lockers by a simple arrangement — the club’s staff members have duplicate keys for every locker.