Hazards of transporting Cash

Dear (s)                                                                                                               
(This incident occurred during Sept 2008 and was shared on e mal with my friends on 24/09/2008)


Transporting cash from one place to another is a hazardous activity and many traders do carry cash in huge quantity. Though plastic money, money transfer and so many other modes are available, business community do transact their business in cash. When organizations need to transport money in bulk quantity, they carry it in locked boxes in vehicles of Security agencies, escorted by armed guards. There are even armoured cars enabled with GPS that would facilitate remote locking of cash chest inside.

Not so safe all the time. For many a times, the money that is being moved may not be accounted at all or the transaction would require hard cash. The firms then employ ingenious methods in moving cash - quite often the person carrying would look innocuous and would
do without any accompaniment or security. There will not be insurance protection for such types of transporation, primarily because the parties would not want any record of the transaction involving movement of huge cash. Not a happy story all time and sometimes, they do land up in great trouble just as a Trichy based jeweller experienced recently. On Aug 10th, they were transporting 3.72 crores (approx -$885700) in hard cash from Trichy to Chennai, when the van was stopped in a place near Veppur by somebody posing as policeman. The occupants were forced to open the door, tied and pushed into the vehicle. They escaped after shifting the cash into their car. The van was abandoned near Trichy.

A heist is a slang North American term for a type of robbery. One incident of notoriety was the robbery at the Lufthansa at John F. Kennedy International Airport in Dec 1978 when an estimated $5 million in cash and $875,000 in jewels were stolen touted as the largest cash robbery ever committed on American soil. In our own country, the Chelambra bank robbery in the Malappuram district of Kerala is considered to be one of the biggest and most sensational bank robberies in the crime history. During 2007, , the robbers made a hole in the floor of the South Malabar Gramin Bank and got away with 80 kilograms of gold and 2,500,000 rupees, a total value of 80 million Indian Rupees. In a swift operation the Kerala Police apprehended the culprits and recovered almost 80%


There were not many clues in the 3.72 crore robbery at Veppedu, near Villupuram but Police had a lucky breakthrough. The accused boasted of his new found wealth in a drunken stupor in a TASMAC (Govt. shop selling liquor) leading to the arrest of all the four culprits involved in the case. On Tuesday, the city police announced the arrests, including that of two employees of jewellery shop, for their involvement in looting the cash from the van. Police have recovered a Maruti Omni and Rs 1.50 crore. It is stated that the two employees had eavesdropped owner's conversation of shipping a huge amount to Chennai for buying gold jewellery. The two had
sought some financial help from their employer earlier and were angry as it was denied.

The recovery of Rs.1.50 cr should certainly bring lot of cheer to the owners and credit to the TN Police for this swift operation.

With Regards
S Sampathkumar