The Hindu : New Delhi News : Retired bank manager, sister held on fraud charge

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Aug 13, 2004

New Delhi

New Delhi

Retired bank manager, sister held on fraud charge

By Our Staff Reporter

NEW DELHI, AUG. 12. A retired manager of the Punjab and Sindh Bank and his sister have been arrested by the Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of the Delhi police for allegedly duping a woman of Rs. 65 lakhs in the name of getting a petrol pump allotted to her in the United States.

The accused had taken voluntary retirement from service to escape the police net. According to the police, the complainant, Ruma Kaur, was based in Agartala, Tripura, and the main accused, Joginder Singh Raina, then a manager with the Punjab and Sindh Bank in Agartala, was her tenant a few years ago.

Raina developed friendly relations with Ms. Kaur's family within a short time and suggested that he could get her a petrol pump in the US, which would fetch her huge profits. After managing to convince her, Raina told Ms. Kaur that around Rs. 80 lakhs would be needed for the purpose.

Ms. Kaur then sold her Agartala property and gave Rs. 22 lakhs to Raina in advance. She then shifted to Delhi on Raina's advice and bought a 200-square yard plot at Khirki Extension in Malviya Nagar, South Delhi. The plot was in joint ownership of Raina and Ms. Kaur. She also bought two janata flats in Rohini and a Tata Sumo.

On the pretext of getting her the documents necessary for going to the US, Raina also got several blank papers signed by Ms. Kaur. Subsequently, he forged the ownership documents by planting the name of her sister, Harminder Kaur. When this came to light, Ms. Ruma, who was living in Rohini got a case lodged in Prashant Vihar police station and the case was transferred to the EOW. Investigations revealed that Raina had convinced Ms. Kaur to award the power of attorney to him as she would need somebody to look after her properties here once she went to the US. The brother-sister duo then went ahead and sold half of the Khirki Extension plot to a builder, Dinesh Kumar, at almost half the market rate.

Raina then went on to sell the two Janata flats and the Tata Sumo, as well as three trucks which the complainant owned, for a total of Rs. 15 lakhs.

Earlier, Ms. Kaur, unaware of Raina's intentions, had also deposited Rs. 3 lakhs in his Bank (Raina had by now become the manager of the Anand Vihar Branch in East Delhi).

However, later when she wanted the money back on maturity, the Bank told him that no such deposits were made.

As the queries from Ms. Kaur increased, Raina opted for voluntary retirement so that he could enjoy pension benefits and also escape from the police net. All this while, his sister had actively connived with him to misappropriate the property.

Harminder has been sent to judicial custody, while Raina has been remanded to police custody.

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