Man threatens bank staff with gun

The CCTV footage of the incident shows a furious Vetrivelan, a workshop owner from Somayampalayam attacking and threatening to shoot a person inside the Ramanathapuram branch of Canara Bank in Coimbatore on Tuesday.

When the bank’s chief manager Chandrasekaran intervened, he too was assaulted with a knife. Soon, other staff rushed into the cabin of the chief manager, but they also came under the receiving end. The staff then managed to overpower Vetrivelan and informed the Race Course police.

Panic prevailed for a while as the customers assumed the gun wielding man to be a robber ran out of the bank to safety. Police investigations revealed that Vetrivelan was upset after his request for loan was turned down by the bank, a few days ago.

Police said Gunabalan, a middle man from Tatabad area approached Vetrivelan and assured to help him get the loan amount for a commission of Rs 6 lakh. He also took an initial commission amount of Rs 3 lakh and agreed to get the balance after the loan amount issanctioned.

However, the bank rejected his loan application after Vetrivelan was found to be a loan defaulter with another bank. Police said Vetrivelan believed that Gunabalan had conned him and unleashed the daring attack against them in the bank.

The Race Course police arrested the accused and booked him under IPC sections 332 (voluntarily causing hurt to deter a public servant from discharging his duty, 452 (tress pass with a preparation to hurt, assault or wrongful restraint) and 506 (ii) for criminalintimidation.

Vetrivelan was produced in court and remanded to judicial custody. Meanwhile, the CCTV image of the incident has gone viral insocial media.