|
Durgapur, July 31: An Eastern Coalfields Ltd (ECL) employee has lodged an FIR alleging Rs 25,000 was withdrawn from his account after his card got locked inside an unguarded ATM in Durgapur on Friday.
“I had gone to a Syndicate Bank ATM kiosk in the Benachity area around 8am on Friday. After I inserted my debit card into the slot, keyed in my password and entered the amount I wanted to withdraw, the machine stopped responding. The card also did not come out of the machine even though I pressed the cancel button repeatedly,” said Naba Kumar Hazra, a telecom operator in an open-cast mine.
He said there was no guard outside the kiosk and the bank was yet to open. “So I stood inside the counter, not knowing what to do.”
Another man entered the kiosk but his transaction was also displayed as failed, Hazra said. “He hurriedly walked away. I was surprised how he could push his card and manage to get back it when mine got stuck,” he added.
Hazra informed the bank authorities but when an engineer sent by the bank opened the machine under the Benachity branch, he did not find Hazra’s ATM inside it.
Bank manager Sunakar Nayak said the keypad of the machine had been tampered with and added the bank would collect the CCTV footage to know what happened after Hazra’s card got stuck.
The bank’s ATM operation section in Bangalore, which tracks all transactions, said Rs 25,000 had been withdrawn in three phases from a State Bank of India ATM in the area.
Nayak said he had informed the matter to the manager of the SBI branch so that he could inquire the matter and collect the CCTV footage of its ATM counter.
Arijit Dasgupta, the officer in charge of Durgapur police station, said: “We have started an investigation and will seek the CCTV footage from the ATM counter.”
Police said they would interrogate a gang they had arrested in connection with tampering of ATM machines.
|
