Daijiworld Media Network - Udupi (SP)

Udupi, Apr 1: The bank staff have a new problem on hand. The hand sanitiser bottles they have been keeping inside their ATMs in the interests of their own customers are going missing within a day.

The finance ministry has instructed the lead district managers through banks to ensure that hand sanitisers are kept inside the ATMs to help the customers to stay clear of coronavirus infection as they use their hands and fingers to punch numbers count cash and operate the door. All the banks were happy having done their duty by placing sanitisers inside their ATMs.

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There are 1,193 ATMs in undivided Dakshina Kannada district. Udupi district has 410 bank branches while Dakshina Kannada has 641. The customers are alerted through messages to use sanitisers to protect from infections. There is shortage of sanitisers in coastal Karnataka and the people find it hard to get one. Perhaps because of this problem, the customers are picking the sanitisers from the ATMs and taking them away. The bank managers are at a loss of ideas how such thefts can be stopped as even when CCTV footage is checked, it becomes difficult to identify the stranger who comes in, picks up the sanitiser and goes away, duly taking care not to get himself properly captured by the camera.

Praveen and Rudresh, lead district managers of Dakshina Kannada and Udupi districts respectively, said that the ATMs are kept clean by cleaning them at least twice a day. They agreed that there are complaints about the theft of sanitisers. There have also been a few cases where the managers could not keep the sanitisers because of shortage of sanitisers in the market.