TIRUCHY: Four employees of a private company handling the loading of cash in ATMs were arrested on Saturday after they were found to have siphoned off Rs 1.34 crore over three years.
According to police, a Chennai-based firm handles loading of money in ATMs of 24 banks including Canara bank, City Union bank, Oriental Bank and IDBI in the city. Recently, officials of the respective banks conducted an audit in which they found a mismatch of accounts between the account loaded in the ATMs and bank records.
Subsequentky, they conducted a detailed inquiry, during which it came to light that the employees of the private firm had stolen Rs 1.34 crore on different occasions. Later, the information was passed on to the private firm by the respective bank officials.
On January 26, Arulraj, the manager of the Chennai-based firm, lodged a formal complaint with Cantonement police. Based on the complaint, police secured James (36) of Palakkarai, Ravichandran (28), Moorthy (40) both from Srirangam and Ravi (24) of Pettaivaithalai and questioned them. During interrogation, all the four confessed to their offence and said they had loaded less amount into the ATMs. For instance, they loaded Rs 18 lakh instead of Rs 20 lakh. Since no one noticed it, they continued with the offence for over three years.
At ATMs in urban areas, a maximum of Rs 35 lakh used to be loaded while in rural locations Rs 10 lakh was loaded. Police said whenever an ATM goes out of order, these employees are called to service them. During such times, they used to take away whatever money is left behind in the machine. In this manner, they had stolen around 5 lakh, police added.