More skeletons are tumbling out of the closets of those accused in the multi-crore South Indian Education (SIES) Trust scam. The Economic Offences Wing (EOW) is investigating another case against 11 of the accused, who had allegedly induced another company into investing Rs 141.80 crore in a fixed deposit (FD) in a bank and later siphoning money through an overdraft facility by submitting bogus documents. The amount they swindled is yet to be known.

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How did they do it?According to EOW sources, the accused induced a private company into investing Rs 141.80 crore in an FD in Dhanlaxmi Bank with the false promise of high returns. Once the FD was done, the accused prepared bogus documents of the company, and their basis got an overdraft facility on the FD. The clearing amount was then transferred to the accounts of various other companies by the accused.

What action did the police take?Once the fraud came to light, a complaint was registered at Marine Drive police station on July 28 against Avinash Khandagle, Amar (known only by his first name) and nine other SIES accused, sources said. They have been booked under sections 120 B (criminal conspiracy), 409 (criminal breach of trust), 465 (punishment for forgery), 468 (forgery for the purpose of cheating), 471 (using as genuine a forged document), 506 (criminal intimidation) and 420 (cheating) of the Indian Penal Code. Additional commissioner of police, EOW, Rajvardhan Sinha, said, "We have registered one more complaint against the accused who were earlier arrested for the SIES scam."

The master of forgery"Avinash Khangadle was arrested by the EOW in the SIES fraud case on Saturday. He was instrumental in forging the trust's documents for the other accused so they could avail of the overdraft facility on the trust's FD in the Lokhandwala branch of a nationalised bank. The accused in this case, including Khangadle had used similar modus operandi," said a senior police officer, requesting anonymity.