Alert BMTC staff caught a driver attached to KSRTC stealing one of their buses from Kempegowda bus stand (KBS) late on Wednesday night. Bus conductor Manjunath and Ambarish, who were sleeping nearby, were woken up when the vehicle was started. They ran after the bus and were soon joined by their colleagues. On catching up with the bus, they learnt that the culprit was Maruthi Patil (41) from Anekal depot.
Enquiries by the police revealed that Patil had taken half-a-day’s leave from work to go to Anekal to attend his father-in-law's funeral. Since there was no transportation at that late hour, he decided to drive away in a BMTC bus.
Investigation ruled out his involvement in a previous theft of a BMTC bus. It may be recalled that a BMTC bus was stolen from KBS earlier this month. It was abandoned in Dronachalam in Andhra Pradesh.
