BENGALURU: Residents of Koramangala have raised safety concerns after nine houses in the area were burgled in a single night on May 4.
A police officer said as most personnel were deployed for election duty, night patrolling had come down, emboldening the burglars to strike with impunity.
Padmashree Balaram, president of the Koramangala 1st Block Resident Welfare Association, said CCTV footage showed two persons moving around the locality where the houses were burgled between 1 am and 4.30 am.
The footages showed one of them jumping the compound wall of a house while the other kept a watch outside.
“After jumping the compound wall, the burglar then searches for shoes and steals them. From each house, five to six pairs of expensive sports shoes were stolen. Some shoes ordered from the US and costing Rs 30,000 have also been stolen. The burglars also stole two bicycles from a house. We have complained to the police and also to local MLA Ramalinga Reddy, who assured us of arranging an additional 25 CCTV cameras and also increasing police patrolling,” Balaram said.
Residents said one of the burglars looked directly at the CCTV camera before committing the crime.
A senior police officer from Koramangala station said normally, police patrolling is more extensive in these areas, but as some personnel were election duty, this was affected. “As elections in the state are over, the focus will be more on night patrolling in these areas,” said the official.