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Bank official robbed, shot at in Zirakpur
This made for the third firing incident reported in Tricity within a span of few hours – two were reported in Chandigarh during the intervening night of Thursday and Friday when two unidentified men barged into a pharmacy and opened fire at one of the owners
In yet another incident raising serious questions over the law and order situation in Tricity, a senior bank official was robbed and shot at, in Zirakpur’s Aerocity area on Friday morning.
This made for the third firing incident reported in Tricity within a span of few hours – two were reported in Chandigarh during the intervening night of Thursday and Friday when two unidentified men barged into a pharmacy and opened fire at one of the owners, while in a separate incident, shots were fired outside a builder’s house in Sector 21, in what appears to be an extortion attempt.
In the Zirakpur incident, the victim, Sudhanshu Kumar, a resident of Block H, Aerocity, said that he was driving to work around 9 am when two masked men, riding a Bullet motorcycle, suddenly stopped close to his car amid the dense fog.
“I initially suspected a minor collision when the motorcycle blocked my path. The riders then gestured to me to roll down the car window. As I complied, the situation escalated rapidly. The pillion rider grabbed my hand and forcibly attempted to snatch a gold bracelet and a gold chain that I was wearing,” the complainant said.
When the victim tried to roll up the window to protect himself, the assailants reportedly smashed the driver’s side window using a heavy object. The attackers then allegedly pulled out a firearm, pointed it at him, and threatened him, forcing him to hand over his gold bracelet weighing around 15 grams and a gold chain weighing approximately 16 grams.
The robbers then demanded that the victim remove his rings as well. Fearing for his life, the complainant tried to drive away from the spot. “As I accelerated, one of the assailants fired a shot towards my car. The bullet struck the windshield glass but somehow missed me,” Kumar added.
The victim later approached the police and lodged a complaint.
Confirming the incident, Zirakpur police station SHO Labh Singh said a case had been registered against two unidentified men under Sections 304 (snatching) and 3(5) (common intention) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS).
He said closed-circuit television (CCTV) camera footage from nearby areas is being examined to trace the accused.
“Due to dense fog, the exact location of the crime could not be clearly identified even by the complainant. So far, during the investigation, no pieces of broken window glass have been recovered from the spot. The matter is under investigation,” the SHO said.
