Three people have been arrested in India after a daring 70 million rupees ($800,000; £600,000) heist in which armed men posing as central bank officials robbed an ATM cash van.
On Saturday police in Bengaluru announced they had cracked the case and recovered 57.6 million rupees of the stolen money.
Police commissioner Seemant Kumar Singh revealed that three suspects had been detained and that the investigation is ongoing to recover the remainder of the stolen cash.
The suspects include Gopal Prasad, an employee of cash transport company CMS, a former CMS worker named J Xavier, and local police constable Annappa Naik.
The robbery, executed in broad daylight in Bengaluru's Lalbagh area, involved the thieves pretending to be officers of the Reserve Bank of India. They halted the cash transport vehicle, claiming to check the paperwork for such a large sum of money.
The gang instructed the vehicle's cash custodian and two security guards to enter an SUV while one member took control of the van.
The thieves employed tactics such as changing vehicles, using false registration plates, and selecting locations with minimal CCTV coverage to move the cash.
A massive hunt was initiated with more than 200 police officers mobilized across various states including Karnataka, Kerala, and Tamil Nadu.
Detectives are also probing the role of CMS and any potential guideline violations regarding cash transport procedures.
Singh noted that cash transport vehicles must vary their routes and timings to avoid predictability.
