Gold firm’s sales manager booked for ₹50 lakh fraud

Mumbai: A sales manager with a gold trading company was booked for allegedly stealing varying quantities of gold – that was to be delivered to various clients – over the last three years

Mumbai: A sales manager with a gold trading company was booked for allegedly stealing varying quantities of gold – that was to be delivered to various clients – over the last three years. A preliminary probe revealed that in the last two years, the accused has bought a flat worth ₹1.50 crore, spent ₹25 lakh on its interiors and deposited large amounts of money in his wife’s and in-laws’ accounts.

Gold firm’s sales manager booked for ₹50 lakh fraud

The FIR was registered on Saturday against Dhananjay Sangani, a resident of Kandivali working with a firm based in Khar. The FIR was registered based on a complaint submitted by the firm in August last year, which also included an audit report detailing Sangani’s alleged crimes.

In the complaint, Pawanpal Anand, a partner with the Khar-based firm, stated that Sangani joined the company in November 2019 and quickly became a trusted employee due to his apparent efficiency and transparency. The firm picks up raw gold and delivers it to designers, and picks up the finished product to deliver it to jewellers in the city. Sangani was assigned a specific client who was associated with the firm for the last four years.

“The firm’s entire operations shifted to the work-from-home model during the pandemic, during which time Sangani was assigned the job of coordinating with the client. After operations returned to normalcy, the firm conducted an audit in May 2022 and found large-scale irregularities in the accounts,” said an officer with the Khar police.

In his complaint letter, Anand stated that in a detailed internal investigation, it was allegedly found that Sangani would only deliver part of the gold to the clients while stealing the rest. This would allegedly be done either while delivering the raw gold to the client or while delivering the finished jewellery to those who had placed orders.

As per the complaint, the most recent example of this alleged misappropriation came to light in a transaction dated June 11, 2022, when Sangani was asked to deliver 38.93 grams of gold to the client but was only handed more than 14.98 grams. At the time, he was accompanied by another employee but Sangani allegedly asked him to wait outside and went in alone.

“The complaint letter has named several such transactions, dating back to 2020, where various quantities of gold mysteriously went missing before being delivered either to jewellers or designers,” the officer added. “In all instances, Sangani was directly involved and other employees also told the firm that in some cases, Sangani intercepted them while they were on their way to deliver the gold, and took over the delivery himself.”

According to a report by the complainant firm, a total of 998.42 grams of gold, worth ₹50 lakh, has gone missing under Sangani’s charge since 2020. Parallelly, the partners at the firm also made discreet inquiries about Sangani’s lifestyle and found that he had bought a flat in Kandivali for ₹1.50 crore, reworked its entire interior for ₹25 lakh and transferred large amounts of money to bank accounts owned by his wife, his father-in-law and his brother-in-law.

Based on the complaint, Khar police conducted its inquiries and, after finding merit in the allegations, booked Sangani, his wife and his in-laws for criminal breach of trust, cheating and forgery under the Indian Penal Code.

Police officers said that Sangani’s sources of income as well as hereditary wealth are being verified and compared with his assets, and he will be given ample opportunity to explain the irregularities in the accounts before further action is taken against him.