Mohali businessman, kin booked for defrauding friend of ₹1.75 crore

Flee country without paying of ₹60-lakh loan to Mohali resident

Already declared a proclaimed offender (PO) in a ₹11-lakh cheque bounce case, a Mohali-based businessman has now been booked for cheating his friend of ₹1.75 crore.

Besides Paramvir Singh Dhanoa, police at the Sohana station have also booked his wife, Rajwinder Kaur, and father, Jaspreet Singh, under Sections 420 (cheating and dishonestly inducing delivery of property), 406 (criminal breach of trust) and 120B (criminal conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code. They are all residents of Sector 91, and are absconding.

The case was registered on the complaint of Rohit Jain, a resident of Sector 100, Mohali.

TOOK ₹60-LAKH LOAN

Jain told the police that he and Dhanoa were childhood friends since when they lived in the same neighbourhood in Sector 21, Chandigarh.

He alleged that Dhanoa, who ran a business of air-conditioners in Sector 82, Mohali, had approached him with his family members in December 2015, seeking financial help. Following this, he lent him ₹60 lakh.

“When I asked him to settle the loan, he and his family started making excuses. Later, he made a deal with me to sell his industrial plot,” Jain claimed, adding that he bought the plot and deposited ₹90 lakh in Dhanoa’s bank account and ₹20 lakh in his wife’s account.

Jain alleged that the family later asked him to pay another ₹5 lakh, and requested him to extend the date of registry from April 13, 2018 to October 15, 2018. “When the new date approached, they requested to extend it again to May 30, 2019,” Jain alleged, adding that they then entered into a fresh agreement under which Dhanoa gave him three postdated cheques as security.

Jain alleged that he recently came to know that the family had sold the plot to another party, and had shifted to Canada without paying his ₹1.75 crore back, including the original loan amount.

Last week, a Mohali court had declared Dhanoa a fugitive in a ₹11-lakh cheque bounce case.

The complainant, Avatar Singh, manager (legal) with Cheema Boilers in Mohali, complained to the court that they paid Dhanoa’s firm ₹42 lakh to install air-conditioners in their Phase-8B office. But the firm did not finish the work.

When they approached the firm to refund the amount, Dhanoa returned ₹12 lakh, and issued a cheque for another ₹11 lakh. But the cheque bounced, following which the company approached court.