The Hindu : New Delhi News : Bank employees arrested for embezzlement

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Apr 06, 2005

New Delhi

New Delhi

Bank employees arrested for embezzlement

By Our Staff Reporter

NEW DELHI, APRIL 5. Four persons, including two employees and a former employee with a cooperative bank, have been arrested by the Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of the Crime Branch for alleged embezzlement of over Rs. 1 crore from the bank exchequer by tampering with the computer records and diverting the money to fictitious accounts opened in other banks.

According to the Deputy Commissioner of Police (EOW), Prabhakar, Janata Cooperative Bank Limited authorities had recently lodged a fraud case at Darya Ganj police station after they detected at least two cases of embezzlement worth over Rs. 10 lakhs through manipulation of computer records.

The case was transferred to the EOW and a probe initiated by a team under the Assistant Commissioner of Police, M.K. Sharma.

The police gathered the bank records and found that while certain cheques, which were cleared by the bank, bore signatures in English, in the bank specimen signature records, the signatures of the stated account holders were in Hindi, revealing that bank data had been forged.

Further probe revealed that 18 of the closed accounts had been fraudulently made operational, whereas eight accounts were made operation in different names by replacing the specimen signature cards with fake ones. In these cases, the police found that no account-opening forms had been filled. Also, two overdraft-facility accounts were opened. A closer scrutiny of the records led the police to discover that over Rs. 73.11 lakhs had been directed to accounts with Canara Bank at Ballimaran, Bank of India at Connaught Place and Vijaya Bank in Karol Bagh, in the name of three fictitious firms -- Decent Realtors, Pooja Speakers and S.K. Financials and a man, Ram Kumar Yadav. Realising that the misappropriation had been done by tampering with computer records, the police interrogated the bank's former systems manager, Karam Singh, who allegedly confessed to his involvement.

The police learnt that Karam along with the bank employees, Ajay and Naveen Jain, passed fake cheques and other payments in the closed accounts, from which the money were withdrawn. It came to light that Ajay, in connivance with his accomplice, Jaipal Kapoor, had allegedly opened one of the overdraft accounts against a fixed deposit of Rs. 85,500. Against this account, the accused bank employees cleared a debt of Rs. 9.5 lakhs, which was much beyond the permissible limit. After the bank changed the computer software, Karam quit the job fearing detection of the fraud committed by him. At his instance, the police have arrested Ajay, Naveen and Jaipal. They have also sealed a flat worth about Rs. 40 lakhs at Paschim Vihar that Karam had allegedly bought from the "ill-gotten" money. Further investigations are on.

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