Businessman accused of Rs 4,500 crore investor fraud held

 

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Mateen Hafeez | TNN | May 31, 2018, 04:48 IST

MUMBAI: City businessman Omprakash Goenka who has been accused of defrauding around 18 lakh investors across the state of about Rs 4,500 crore has been arrested by Nashik cops from his Wadala office in one of the cheating cases. Goenka’s Royal Twinkle Star Club (RTSC) had allegedly lured investors with high returns. These investors were promised a total returns of around Rs 7,500 crore.
In August 2015, the securities and exchange board of India (Sebi) had imposed a four-year ban on the firm and its four directors for illegally raising over Rs 2,656 crore in the garb of ‘time share’ holiday plans. The capital market regulator, which had been keeping a close watch on illicit money-pooling schemes, had directed the company to refund the money along with promised returns to the investors.

The Nashik (Rural) economic offences wing (EOW) police personnel picked up Goenka from his office on May 21 after a group of investors from Lasalgaon, near Malegaon, lodged a complaint saying they were cheated of Rs 1.8 crore by RTSC. While Goenka is the MD of RSTC, police are yet to arrest three directors. Goenka has been sent to police custody till May 31.

One of the victims, Kavita Pagar (38), a homemaker, said she had invested Rs 15 lakh she had saved over the years. “We have got around 1,200 to 1,300 investors so far. The have approached us,” said an officer from the Nashik EOW. The Mumbai EOW is also probing a separate case against RTSC office bearers for cheating thousands of investors. The Mumbai EOW has so far received over 500 complaint letters.


“The complaint was first registered at Mumbai’s Rafi Ahmed Kidwai Marg police station and later transferred to the EOW. The investors include farmers, labourers, teachers, government employees, businessmen and agents. The schemes—Crystal, Saffron, Gold, Silver, Bronze, Royal and Orange —continued from 2008 to 2016,” said a police officer.

RTSC ran such schemes across the country, said a police officer. In the Mumbai case, the complainant, who works as a manager at a liquor shop, was also an agent for the firm and had invested not only his own money, but also of his relatives and clients, said police.

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“The accused had also promised hotel stay packages, based on the reward points, to the investors. We have booked the accused under various sections of the Indian Penal Code and stringent law Maharashtra Protection of Interest of Depositors’ Act,” added an officer.
The EOW had early this year carried out searches at six places in Mumbai.   

The Times of India, May 31, 2018

Police seek BMC staff’s handwriting samples

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Mateen Hafeez and Richa Pinto | TNN | May 27, 2018, 02:56 IST

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Mumbai: The police will seek writing samples of several BMC employees as part of the investigation into the tampering of municipal commissioner Ajoy Mehta’s remarks on a file about land acquisition in Jogeshwari.

An FIR was registered at the Azad Maidan police station on Friday. The police said they had sought CCTV footage from BMC officials to establish the identity of the two persons who entered the BMC office, accessed the file and changed the notings.

“We have asked them to help us with inputs to identify the accused. We will check CCTV footage to see if they met some people on their way,” said an officer.

The police may also send the CCTV footage to the forensic laboratory in Kalina to enhance the resolution of the images. Two unidentified persons had entered the development plan department in the BMC headquarters and made the changes on a file pertaining to acquisition of over 13,674 sq m of land in Majas, Jogeshwari (east).

The matter came to light when development plan department officials reading the remarks about the plot noticed that a note to file a special leave petition in the Supreme Court against an order passed against the BMC in Bombay high court had been changed to read: “We shouldn’t challenge this in the Supreme Court.” Mehta had in his order on the file said: “We should challenge this in Supreme Court.”

The Times of India, May 27, 2018