Hyderabad: In a major fraud bust, the Ramagundam police arrested 44 persons, including three employees of the State Bank of India (SBI), on charges of misappropriation and theft of 25.17 kilograms of gold on Sunday, August 31.
The arrest was made based on a complaint by Chennur SBI regional manager, Ritesh Kumar Gupta, who stated that 402 gold loan accounts, jewellery worth Rs 12.61 crore and another Rs 1.10 crore in cash were stolen from the bank.
“Four investigating teams were formed. During the probe, they conducted an audit on the account of cashier Narige Ravinder, and found serious irregularities and huge amounts of deposits in his bank account,” said Ramagundam police commissioner Amber Kishore Jah.
During interrogation, Ravinder confessed to the crime and being a part of a larger nexus. “Last year, he lost Rs 40 lakhs in online cricket betting. To recover the amount, he committed fraud with the help of SBI branch manager Vennapureddy Manohar and an outsourcing employee named Lakkakula Sandeep,” the commissioner said.
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The bank’s main currency chest is in joint custody of the branch manager and cashier. Taking advantage of the benefit, Manohar and Ravinder started stealing gold and cash frequently.
Since October last year, Ravinder has mortgaged the gold and handed it to his friends working in SBFC, Mancherial. They are Kongondi Beeraiah, a sales manager; Kodati Rajashekhar, a customer relation manager and Bolli Kishan, a sales officer.
“All three were working in a private gold lending company. After receiving gold from Ravinder, the trio, along with other friends, pledged it to other companies. They transferred the cash to Ravinder and received commission in return,” the police commissioner said.
He informed that the accused persons had mortgaged in 10 private gold lending companies, including SBFC, Indel Money, Muthoot Finance, Godavari Urban, Manappuram, Muthoot Fincorp and Muthoot Mini.
Further, Ravinder, in collusion with the branch manager, sanctioned 42 fake gold loans in the names of his wife, sister-in-law and friends without any gold being pledged.
Through this, he drew Rs 1.58 crore while projecting that 4.14 kg of gold had been mortgaged, taking the actual loss of jewellery to 21 kg.
“Ravinder also siphoned off cash during ATM replenishments,” said Ramagundam.
He also praised the investigating team for their efforts and their swift detection of the case.
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