liquor

Beverages Corporation

booze thieves

Miscreants made away with more than 30 boxes ofworth over Rs 4 lakh from trucks parked inside the Karnataka State(KSBC) godown premises in Sheshadripuram recently. Thestruck multiple times between March 27 and April 1.From a theft case, the matter turned more serious after a security guard deployed at the depot, caught a few youths red-handed when they had sneaked inside the depot in the night. One of the men kept the guard at knifepoint, to enable the culprits to escape.Based on a complaint filed by the depot manager Govindaraju BM, the Srirampura police have registered a case of theft, trespass and lurking house trespass or house-breaking by night.Govindaraju says this has happened before too. ”Two years ago, during an election, a group of men trespassed into the godown and made away with liquor worth Rs 2 lakh. These men from the nearby slum are notorious for such activities and commit it with such brazenness that even five guards deployed are not enough to handle them,” Govindaraju told BM.Around 35 vehicles with loads of liquor had come to the depot on Platform Road in Sheshadripuram on March 23 and 24. As the lockdown came into effect from the midnight of March 24, and only 18 vehicles had been unloaded by then, 17 vehicles with the booze were parked inside the KSBC godown premise. “As a lockdown was on, we had shut the godown and covered the locked trucks with sheets,” Govindaraju said.There are at least five security guards for the eight doors of the godown. Through the middle of the night between March 27 and April 1, more than a dozen men jumped inside and moved the covered sheets and made away with cartons from the truck which initially did not come to the notice of the security staff. On April 1, a guard who was washing his clothes, heard noises from the truck and rushed to the place. That is when one of the miscreant flashed a knife and all escaped.The next morning, the guards brought the incident to the notice of Govindaraju who took the stock and found at least 25 to 30 liquor boxes were missing. He estimated the stolen boxes to be worth Rs 3 to 4 lakh and informed his higher-ups. The depot manager’s seniors instructed the 17 trucks to be moved to their other godown in Bagalgunte. There are no CCTVs installed here so the cops are finding it hard to identify the culprits from footage around the area as they sneaked in only in the night.