2 Surat traders dupe garment suppliers of ₹36 lakh

“We have registered a case on the charges of criminal breach of trust and cheating against the accused. We are investigating the matter and recording the statement of all the suppliers. The accused has not been arrested yet and a police team will soon visit Surat for inquiry,” the police said

MUMBAI: Two garment traders from Surat have been booked for allegedly duping several Mumbai-based suppliers to the tune of ₹36.33 lakh in the past two years.

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According to the Mulund police, complainant Naitik Bhailal Savla, 30, a resident of Mulund (East), told them that his father Bhailal Savla, 65, has been into garment manufacturing for the past four decades and he has been helping his father in the business for the last 10 years.

Savla in his statement to the police said that in 2020, he had received a phone call from a man named Neeraj Jain, who offered to purchase clothes from them for his retail and wholesale business in Surat.

After a meeting in Mulund, Savla’s father visited Jain’s business establishment in Surat and they began working together. For one year, Jain was paying the father-son duo regularly and won their trust.

In July 2021, Jain introduced the Savlas to a woman named Aradhna Singh, who owned a kids wear business in Surat. Since Jain was trusted by the father-son duo, they agreed to do business with Singh. They also introduced Jain and Singh to 8-10 other wholesalers in Mumbai, who supplied clothes to the duo.

Singh and Jain ordered clothes from the wholesalers, but both failed to pay the due amounts to the sellers. The wholesalers then questioned Savla as he was the one who had introduced Jain and Singh to them and had taken commission on the supply.

When the complainant went to Surat to confront Jain and Singh, they abused and threatened him and told him in clear terms that they would not pay the amount, a police officer said.

“We have registered a case on the charges of criminal breach of trust and cheating against the accused. We are investigating the matter and recording the statement of all the suppliers. The accused has not been arrested yet and a police team will soon visit Surat for inquiry,” Kantilal Kothimbire, senior inspector, said.