Mangalore: The city Police Commissioner, Seemanth  K.Singh on Thursday informed Press that the State Bank ATM robbery attempt, foiled by local police with public assistance resulting in the capture of a gang of 4 Tamilian criminals at Kannur mosque in a KSRTC bus going to Puttur, was a perfect example of police and public co-operation that could help arresting culprits in less than 30 minutes .

He was speaking to reporters in a happy mood on Thursday evening, laughing off an assault of KSRTC bus driver.

The robbers were fleeing on spotting the police, but the local public chased them down, to catch and hand over to the police, with a booty of Rs. 25 lakh meant to be deposited in an ATM of SBI in city.

The police had done well to note down the names of such co-operating public persons, who would be specially feted at the Commissionerate office on Friday, Dec 16, he stated.

When the robbery was made known, the entire police establishment stood up as one, and all of them were on high vigil at vantage points to arrest the culprits.

“Today’s incident proved the efficiency of Mangalore police and the people” Singh lauded.

CPC Singh clarified that the money robbed in an iron box was not Rs.32 lakhs as reported by mistake, but Rs.25 lakhs. Even then, it was quite high. The DG of Police had announced cash prizes for co-operating policemen and citizens, he indicated.

The 4 arrested robbers were identified as Murali, Sridharan, Manindran and Hariharan, all from Tamil Nadu.

DGP would pay Rs. 20,000 to the police team and Rs. 10,000 more will come from CPC.

ACP Dharmaiah, ACP Ravindra Gadadi and DCP Venkatesh Prasanna, with other police incident to Prossmen.

SBI official Raghuram the police team for capturing robbers in such a short time.

Tamil Nadu police team will be here soon to find out more about the gang of culprits, SK Singh informed the reporters.