Noida police arrests three people involved in fradulent transaction of ₹3.9 crore from Noida authority’s bank account

The police have also recovered four forged letters of the Noida authority, two fake fixed deposit receipts, one bank account opening application form, one slip for deposit of ₹5 lakh and ₹5 lakh frozen in the bank accounts of the suspects

The Gautam Budh Nagar police on Tuesday arrested three people who were allegedly involved in fraudulently withdrawing ₹3.9 crore from Noida authority’s account besides attempting another illegal transaction of over ₹9 crore on July 5, senior officers said.

The three suspects in custody. (HT Photo)

According to Shakti Avasthy, additional deputy commissioner of police (Noida), the suspects pretended to be officials of the Noida authority’s finance department and managed to transfer ₹3.9 crore to different accounts in two different transactions with a fake approval letter of the Noida authority. A bigger transaction of ₹9 crore was discovered on time and stopped but ₹3.9 crore went via RTGS to accounts in Gujarat, police said.

“The suspects have been identified as Sudhir Chaudhary, resident of Muradnagar, Ghaziabad, Murari Jatav, a resident of Jahangirabad, Bulandshahr, and Rajesh Babu, a resident of Lucknow. The amount of ₹5 lakh which was found in the bank accounts of these suspects have been freezed. Some more of their associates have been identified and efforts are on to nab them,” Avasthy said.

The police have also recovered four forged letters of the Noida authority, two fake fixed deposit receipts, one bank account opening application form, one slip for deposit of ₹5 lakh and ₹5 lakh frozen in the bank accounts of the suspects.

“During interrogation of the earlier arrested suspect Abdul Khadar, he revealed that on June 30, three men posing as contractors had accompanied Khadar to the bank on the directions of an absconding prime suspect identified as Manupola, and ₹3.9 crore was transferred from the Noida authority’s account to theirs. We traced and arrested the three who posed as contractors,” said the officer.

Manupola then further transferred the money to other accounts, the trail of which is led to Gujarat, he added.

The suspects have been booked under sections 420 (cheating), 467, 468 and 471 (all related to forgery), 120B (party to criminal conspiracy) and 409 (criminal breach of trust by banker) of the Indian Penal Code.

Police said arrested suspect Abdul Khadar, 40, allegedly used a fake ID and other documents to pretend that he was authorised by the authority to handle its ₹200 crore funds at the Bank of India’s Sector 62 branch.

The matter came to the attention of bank officials on July 4 (Tuesday) when he tried to transfer ₹9 crore again from the same account, said authority officials, who filed an FIR at the Sector 58 police station on Tuesday night itself.