An ATM of a nationalised bank was found broken on Chittaranjan Avenue on Sunday morning. Police said the front part of the machine had been damaged but the vault was intact and no theft of money was reported.
The ATM did not have any security guard, an officer said.
The police have found iron rods, bricks and wooden logs inside the ATM kiosk, which they suspect were used to break the front part of the machine.
“It is apparent that iron roads, bricks and wooden logs were used to break the machine. But the vault where the cash is kept is intact,” said an officer of Bowbazar police station, where a case has been lodged.
A pedestrian was the first to spot the damaged ATM, close to the School of Tropical Medicine. He alerted police by dialing 100.
Lalbazar control room then informed the Bowbazar police station about the incident.
The ATM kiosk is on the ground floor of a residential building on Chittaranjan Avenue. The area usually remains busy with vehicular and pedestrian traffic. The police said it was unusual for a kiosk on the thoroughfare to come under attack.
The police said they would study the CCTV footage from the kiosk.
A senior officer said they were almost sure that the ATM attack was not the handiwork of any professional robber or burglar. “A professional robber would have used gas cutters. Here the attackers tried to break the machine using crude methodology,” said the officer.