ATM attack victim recovering, hunt intensified for attacker

The woman, brutally attacked by an armed man at an unguarded ATM kiosk here, is recovering at a hospital today after being paralysed on her right side, even as the police intensified their hunt for the assailant whose gory act caught on cctv footage evoked widespread revulsion.

The 38-year-old bank official who was attacked with a machete was recovering from a "long surgery" and she was able to speak, Dr N K Venkataramana, who performed the operation at the BGS Global Hospital, told reporters here.

He said her skull was fractured and a small piece of bone had gone into the brain, causing a "penetrating injury" and added that she had been paralysed on her right side.

"We have taken all precautions and are closely monitoring her condition. Hope everything will go well... She is able to speak", the doctor said. There was no danger to her life now, he said.

Police Commissioner Raghavendra Auradkar, who visited the victim, said she was recovering and speaking.

He said police officials were being sent to different districts and states to track down the assailant, "who cannot be a first timer".

Auradkar said police had two rounds of meetings with banks on the issue of security at ATM booths earlier and given strict guidelines to them.

In a gruesome attack at the ATM kiosk near a police station in the heart of the city, the woman was repeatedly hit with the machete by the assailant, leaving her in a pool of blood for nearly three hours before the incident came to light when two school children saw blood stains and informed a policeman who shifted her to hospital.

The assailant had attacked her after entering the ATM booth closely following her and downing the rolling shutter when she refused to draw money and hand it over to him, police said.

After the attack, caught on cctv, he had walked out of the kiosk downing the shutter and taking away her mobile, leaving the bleeding woman in a serious condition.