Man who faked abduction held for ₹10 crore fraud after five years

The DCP said Jain and his brother, Manish, ran paper trading and garments businesses from their offices in Chawri Bazar in old Delhi and Gandhi Nagar in east Delhi.

Five years after his family reported his abduction, a 48-year-old businessman, wanted by the economic offences wing (EOW) in a ₹10-crore cheating and forgery case, was arrested last week from Indirapuram, near Ghaziabad -- less than 10km from east Delhi’s Krishna Nagar police station, where the kidnapping case was registered in 2016, police said.

In his complaint to the police, Manish said his brother (Manoj) went to pay ₹15 lakh to a client but he neither reached office nor returned home.

The accused, Manoj Jain, his two sons and his wife, who was a co-accused in the case, were living with him in the ground floor house at Indirapuram since 2018, said deputy commissioner of police (Shahdara) R Sathiyasundaram. The DCP added that a reward of ₹25,000 was recently announced on the arrest of Jain.

“Between his arrest and shifting base from Krishna Nagar to Indirapuram, Jain became a prominent private financer for shopkeepers in Ghaziabad’s Indirapuram, Vaishali and Vasundhara. Some people in his new neighbourhood knew him as Amit, and for many others he was still Manoj Jain. He bought the new house in 2018 in his son’s name for around ₹50 lakh,” said DCP Sathiyasundaram.

The DCP said Jain and his brother, Manish, ran paper trading and garments businesses from their offices in Chawri Bazar in old Delhi and Gandhi Nagar in east Delhi.

Sanjay Kaul, who was a family friend of the Jains, started investing in their business when the Jain brothers convinced him that they will pay him high returns. Kaul, who was running losses in his business, invested nearly ₹10 crore, investigators said.

However, after paying handsome returns initially, the Jains stopped paying, and then refused to return Kaul’s investment. Kaul filed a police complaint in 2015 and named Manoj and Manish Jain, their wives and mother, said an officer from the anti-auto theft squad (AATS) that arrested Jain last week. He added that during initial probe, the police found that there were at least four more who alleged cheating by the Jain brothers.

“When the Jains found that a case would be registered, and they may be arrested, they cooked up an abduction story. In January 2016, Manish filed a missing person’s complaint regarding his brother Manoj at the Krishna Nagar police station,” said the officer, adding that Manish apprehended that his brother has been abducted.

In his complaint to the police, Manish said his brother (Manoj) went to pay ₹15 lakh to a client but he neither reached office nor returned home. Among other suspects, the police also questioned those who were allegedly cheated by the Jain brothers. But over the years, the police could not find any clue.

In March 2017, a cheating and forgery case was registered against the Jains on the orders of a local court, and the investigation was transferred to the EOW. However, by that time all accused named in the complaint by Kaul had gone untraceable. After a while, wives of the Jain brothers and their mother got interim bail from the court. However, the Jain brothers remained absconding, the officer added.

“Jain has confessed that his fake abduction was part of the family’s plan to avoid returning the money to the investors and evade legal action. Before shifting to Indirapuram, he lived in Punjab and Himachal Pradesh. We are looking for his brother Manish who will be booked for filing a fake kidnapping case, besides his involvement in cheating investors,” the DCP added.