THE Guyana Rice Producers Association (GRPA) office on Crane Public Road, West Coast Demerara, was broken into and $2M in cash stolen by five armed bandits early yesterday morning.

Finance Administration Manager Jean Sahadeo told the Guyana Chronicle that she received a telephone call about the break-in around 03:30hrs but did not go at the time.
She reported that the accommodation of several employees was ransacked and a substantial sum of money  taken after the robbers managed to subdue the two unarmed guards.
The security guards on duty were identified as Bissoon Dyal and Rampersaud Singh. The latter hesitated and put up a fight, so the bandits used a gun to inflict blows on him, leaving him with injuries for which he had to be hospitalised at the West Demerara Regional Hospital.
Sahadeo said the bandits also destroyed the locks on both the front and back doors to gain entry into the building, where they spent much time ransacking the premises.
She said the robbers cut the fence to enter the compound after midnight and they had ample time to take the money and escape after beating the guards.
The shocked Sahadeo told this newspaper that she reached the office about 06:30hrs and saw what had happened, and the police were there taking fingerprints, and she noticed that the padlocks to her office door were cut off.
The GRPA had been robbed before, but it was the first time that the building was broken into. Previously, the laboratory, which is housed in the rear of same compound, was the target.
Sahadeo said that the building houses several offices, including that of the GRPA General Secretary, Dharamkumar Seeraj and, as it was after the rice crop, they had collected money from farmers which was kept on the premises.
She added that there are presently 10 employees based there, but only about seven are in the office daily. The others are in the field.