Former bank staff, kin booked for siphoning off ₹88.26 lakh from customers’ accounts

Former bank employee, wife, and family booked for siphoning off ₹88.26 lakh by transferring public money into their accounts. Police investigating the case.

Gurugram: A former employee of a bank, his wife and two other family members were booked for allegedly siphoning off ₹88.26 lakh of public money by fraudulently transferring the amount into their own accounts, police said on Wednesday.

A former employee of a bank, his wife and two other family members were booked for allegedly siphoning off ₹88.26 lakh of public money. (Representational Image)

Investigators said that the suspect was posted at the bank’s Jharsa branch and had targeted six women customers.

According to the police, the incidents took place in August and September last year during which the suspect, while being in service, opened a fraudulent account in the name of one of the victims to liquidate her fixed deposits of ₹50 lakh prematurely and transfer the amount into it so that it could not be detected easily. Later, he transferred the amount into his and his wife’s accounts in different banks.

A senior police official said that after an internal audit following complaints, the bank authorities found that the suspect had delinked victims’ mobile phone numbers from the bank’s system so that they did not receive SMS alerts about transactions.

“Instead, he had linked the numbers of his two relatives and had also issued them debit cards linked with the accounts for withdrawal and UPI transactions. He had liquidated several fixed deposits. He had also prepared back-dated vouchers to embezzle cash deposits made by the victims at the branch,” the official said.

Khushbu Saxena, the branch manager, had alleged in her complaint that the suspect had manipulated customer IDs and the banking software to bypass the system.

Inspector Arjun Dev, Gurugram Sadar station house officer, said they were investigating the case.

Based on Saxena’s complaint, an FIR was registered against the four suspects under various sections of the Indian Penal Code including cheating and criminal conspiracy at Gurugram Sadar police station on Tuesday.