₹52 crore gold vanishes in audacious Canara bank heist in Karnataka

In a heist straight out of a crime thriller, thieves looted gold worth ₹52 crore from the Managuli branch of Canara Bank in Karnataka’s Vijayapura district — marking one of the largest gold thefts in the country’s recent memory.

The theft, meticulously planned and executed, took place between the evening of May 23 and the morning of May 25, but remained undetected until May 26 when bank staff returned after the long weekend. By then, 51 kilograms of gold ornaments, pledged by customers as loan collateral, had vanished without a trace.

Vijayapura Superintendent of Police Laxman Nimbargi confirmed the operation was well-orchestrated, likely involving a group of six to eight people. “We’ve formed eight special teams to trace the accused. They used a duplicate key to enter, disabled the alarm system, switched off CCTV cameras, and even stole the Network Video Recorder to erase digital evidence,” he said.

In a bizarre twist, investigators found a black doll at the crime scene — believed to have been planted to mislead or suggest a ritual, adding a layer of theatrics to the heist.

The thieves appeared to have laser precision in their approach. They accessed only the bank lockers, left cash untouched, and moved swiftly under the cover of a nationwide long weekend. Authorities have yet to determine how the stolen gold was transported out of the premises.

This incident follows a troubling pattern of bank heists targeting gold deposits across Karnataka. In October 2023, a gang looted ₹13 crore worth of gold from an SBI branch in Davanagere. And in January 2024, another ₹12 crore gold robbery was reported from a co-operative bank in Mangaluru. In both cases, police later made arrests — but the Vijayapura case, so far, remains unsolved.

As investigations intensify, the audacity and precision of the Vijayapura heist have sent shockwaves through the banking sector — raising serious questions about security measures at banks handling high-value assets.