Thane District Central CooperativeBank (TDCC) has been cheated to the tune of over Rs. 1.30 crore by a group of three persons, police have said.
A case under IPC Sections 420 (cheating) and 34 (acts done by several persons in furtherance of common intention) has been registered against the trio and a manhunt launched for them, they said.
TDCC is the premier bank of Thane and it recently launched its 100th branch.
Mukund Mahajan, an official at Nalla Sopara police station, said the three - Gopal Mohinder Roy, Chandrakant Deshmukh and Santosh Dattatray Virkar - had taken loans against gold which was deposited in the bank's branches at Nirmal, Tulinj and Nalla Sopara.
As the trio failed to pay loan instalments, the bank on March 28 auctioned the gold deposited with it.
During the auction, the bank officials of the bank came to know that the gold deposited with them was fake.
The trio had taken a loan of Rs. 1,30,94,000 against the gold, police said.