Within five hours of luggage being reported missing by a railway passenger, the Government Railway Police (GRP) traced the missing bags with the help of CCTV footage and returned them to the rightful owners.
The bags contained over Rs. 1 lakh and 20 sovereigns of gold jewellery, worth over Rs. 5 lakh.
It belonged to Thenarasu (48), who works in a private company in Tirupur, and his wife Uma Maheshwari, who had come to Chennai to meet their son.
Around 1.30 p.m. on Wednesday, they reached Chennai Central to take the inter-city express to Tirupur.
Before boarding the train, they decided to lunch at Hotel Saravana Bhavan on the station’s premises.
They had two bags containing cash and jewellery with them at the time. When they got up to leave after eating, Thenarasu found the bags missing. “I immediately alerted the hotel staff and they directed me to the GRP personnel. The policemen came to the restaurant and checked the CCTV footage,” said Thenarasu.
The police narrowed in on a man who seemed to be in his 30s and had come to the restaurant with his family. “We tracked the debit card he had used to settle the food bill and found his name and contact number from the bank,” said V. Ponramu, deputy superintendent of police, GRP, Chennai Central.
The suspect turned out to be Karthikeyan (28), an employee of a private bank. “When contacted over phone, he said he was in Tirupati with his family members. We asked him to hand over the bags immediately,” said Mr. Ponramu.
The bags along with the valuables were handed over to the owners the same day. The police are enquiring if Karthikeyan took the bags intentionally or by mistake. “The swift action by the police helped us in getting our valuables back,” said Thenarasu.
Meanwhile, the GRP propose to use CCTV cameras to nab touts at Central railway station. They will also keep tabs on porters overcharging. There are 82 CCTV cameras at Chennai Central and the GRP monitor them from a control room.
“There have been complaints about unregistered porters fleecing commuters by charging Rs. 1,000 for carrying luggage. Some autorickshaw and cab drivers also overcharge. We will monitor such characters and nab them,” said V. Ponramu.
