Torres fraud: Tausif Riyaz claims he was neither CEO nor stakeholder

MUMBAI: Tausif Riyaz claims he is a whistleblower in the Torres Jewellery fraud, denying CEO and shareholder roles, as he seeks bail amidst ongoing investigations.

MUMBAI: Tausif Riyaz, arrested in connection with the Torres Jewellery fraud, claims he was neither CEO of Platinum Hern Private Limited, which owned the Torres brand, nor a shareholder in the holding company. Instead, he claims, he is a whistleblower who had shared information about the fraud with the police.

Torres fraud: Tausif Riyaz claims he was neither CEO nor stakeholder

Riyaz stated this in his bail plea filed before a special MPID court on Thursday. He also contended that the wanted accused in the case, most of them Ukranians who were absconding, had shifted the burden of the scam onto the Indians.

After Laxmi Yadav, one of the first employees to be arrested in the case from Thane, sent an email to the police commissioners of Mumbai and Thane revealing the fraud, the main accused started a social media campaign in the first week of January, naming Riyaz as the primary accused, the bail plea stated.

Riyaz, who goes by the alias John Carter, was arrested from a hotel in Lonavala in the last week of January, after being on the run for three weeks. Despite claiming to be a whistleblower in the case, police suspect he was a key link who helped the foreigners set up a base in India.

The plea, filed through advocate Trupen Rathod and Vivek Tiwari, claimed that Riyaz was only a consultant to the Torres Jewellery stores and had been falsely implicated in the case. He alleged that some Ukrainian citizens had approached him, seeking his help to open a jewelry store in Mumbai.

Through an e-mail dated January 4, 2025, to the police commissioners of Mumbai, Thane and Navi Mumbai, as well as to SEBI and the RBI, apart from media houses, Riyaz had revealed that the Torres business model was a Ponzi scheme, where low-quality products were being sold at exorbitant prices with the promise of high returns, cashback and bonuses, according to the plea.

The Shivaji Park police, Economic Offences Wing (EOW) and Income Tax Department had already started inquiries into the case since June last year, which showed that the police were aware of the fraud, it added.

Riyaz claimed that he had left Mumbai after receiving death threats from the mastermind of the scam, adding that the Ukrainians were tracking his location. “The applicant states that the applicant’s name was shown as wanted by the Torres company in public domain and in social accounts of Torres Jewellery i.e Instagram, WhatsApp, Telegram,” said the plea.

The plea added that Riyaz “was not handling any store of Torres Jewellery and also applicant was never involved in the management or managing affairs directly or indirectly of any Torres stores”.

Meanwhile, when Riyaz was produced for remand earlier this week, the EOW had told the court that it had received complaints from 10,848 investors in the Torres Jewellery fraud, with the sum involved amounting to ₹117.63 crore.

The EOW has issued Lookout Circulars and Blue Corner Notices for Olena Stoian, director of Platinum Hern; Viktoriia Kovalenko, director of Platinum Hern; Oleksandr Borovyk; Oleksandr Zapichenko; Oleksandra Brunkivska; Oleksandra Tredokhib; Artem Oliferchuk; Lurchenko Igor; and Mustafa Karakoc in connection with the case.

The fraud surfaced on January 6, after six stores under the Torres Jewellery brand abruptly shut a year after luring thousands of small investors to invest in schemes that promised unbelievable weekly returns on the purchase of gold, jewellery and moissanite stones. The EOW has so far arrested six people from Mumbai. Meanwhile, the Enforcement Directorate is also investigating the money laundering angle in the case.