BALANGIR: Two contractual employees of Balangir Central Cooperative Bank were on Sunday arrested for withdrawing money with the ATM cards of the bank’s account holders by fraudulent means.
According to Balangir Town police, the arrested persons are Nilamani Tripathy of Talpalipara and Swagat Mishra of Barpalipara of the town. Nilamani used a bunch of new ATM cards and their PINs which were not delivered to the customers and handed over those to his accomplice Swagat.
“Swagat used to go to unguarded ATM kiosks of different banks wearing helmet to conceal his identity while withdrawing the money,” said a police official. Nilamani and Swagat have withdrawn `8.31 lakh from the accounts of 12 customers so far, he added.
The illegal withdrawal of money came to light when some customers complained to the cooperative bank in this regard. Bedashree Purohit, an account holder of the bank said, “I had deposited `80,000 in the bank. When I went to withdraw the interest amount a few days back, I was told that the money had already been withdrawn from my account.”
Another customer Goura Chandra Puruseth said he had `1,72,000 in his account. “But when I updated my passbook on October 4, I was shocked to find only `36 in my account,” he said.Following the complaints, the manager of the branch lodged a police complaint on November 4. Balangir SP M Sandip Sampat formed a special team to nab the culprits.
Sources said the bank launched debit card operations around a year back. Several customers who were issued debit cards against their accounts are yet to receive those. The bank still has several new unused debit cards along with the PINs.
CEO in-charge of the bank Bankanidhi Rayaguru said initial investigation revealed that the money was withdrawn by contractual outsourced employees of the bank through the debit cards which are yet to be sent to the customers. The bank officials suspect it to be handiwork of an insider as the debit cards are only accessible to the employees.
A police official said it has been established that the duo has withdrawn `8.31 lakh from the accounts of the bank customers. Further details on how much money they have withdrawn so far and involvement of others will be known after a thorough investigation, police said.