Noida authority fraud: 2 arrested in Rs 3.9 crore scam linked to fake bank accounts

NOIDA: Two persons were arrested for allegedly transferring Rs 3.9 crore and attempting to swindle another Rs 9 crore from a Noida Authority account opened at a bank barely 15 days earlier with a deposit of Rs 200 crore.
The case came to light in July last year.

Police recovered seven types of stamp seals, five Aadhaar cards, two PAN cards, 14 debit/credit cards, five cheque books, two passbooks and about 115 printed documents of different private and govt companies, said DCP (crime) Shakti Avasthy.
A cop involved in the investigation said, "The defrauded amount, which has been used up by the arrested accused, was transferred to Gujarat and withdrawn as a hawala transaction."
He added that the mastermind, Manu Bhola, who was employed in Merchant Navy, is a BSc in nautical science graduate and has been swindling money for the past decade. Earlier in Jan, a reward of Rs 25,000 was announced for information about him.
Over the past 14 months, five persons - Abdul Khadri, Sudhir Chaudhary, Murari Jatav Rajesh Babu, and Rajesh Kumar Pandey - were arrested.
A joint team of the crime branch and Sector 58 police arrested Manu Bhola from Kabir Palace Hotel in Karol Bagh on Friday night with an accomplice, Tridib Das. Both are residents of West Bengal, the DCP said.
According to the police, Bhola's modus operandi involved obtaining information about govt department bank accounts and using forged documents to gain power of attorney to operate those accounts.
The bank accounts of all suspects have been frozen. Police said they would recover any amount found in these accounts.
Bhola came to Delhi with Das earlier this week to plan more similar frauds. He told police that he obtained a fake Aadhaar card in the name of Rajiv Kapoor and used it wherever he stayed.
Bhola and Das also attempted to swindle money from the fixed deposit accounts of govt departments in Ranchi about two years ago and in Gorakhpur and Guwahati this year, but they were unsuccessful, said cops.
Police are investigating how the suspects obtained the Authority's documents and the involvement of bank officials. The two arrested suspects were produced before the court and sent to judicial custody on Saturday.
Noida Authority picked the Sector 62 branch of Bank of India to open FD accounts. Last year, on June 26, Noida Authority requested BOI to create two FDs of Rs 100 crore each. The same day, it got the details of the FDs in an email from the bank, but later found them to be fake.
On July 3, when chief finance and accounts officer Manoj Kumar Singh visited the branch to verify the FD details, he discovered they had not even opened. Instead, Rs 3.9 crore had been transferred from the main account to another account, and from there to three personal accounts on June 30, followed by another transfer of Rs 9 crore to a different account just hours before his visit.
When Singh complained, the bank immediately froze the account and managed to block the second transfer.
Investigation revealed Abdul Khadir had come to the branch and identified himself as a Noida Authority official. He carried a letter bearing the forged signatures of officials.