CHENNAI: A 57-year-old film financier from Sowcarpet and his two sons were arrested by the Central Crime Branch (CCB) on Tuesday for allegedly cheating a hotel owner by lending money for usury and trying to take possession of his hotel at T Nagar.
Based on a complaint by Senthil Ganapathy, owner of PRC international hotels private Ltd at T Nagar, CCB sleuths arrested S Mukund Chand Bothra, his sons Sandeep Bothra, and Gagan Bothra.
Police said, in 2016, Senthil had approached Bothra, who runs a finance company seeking `83.50 lakh as loan to renovate and upgrade his hotel at T Nagar.
“For this, Senthil, was asked to transfer `four lakh to Bothra’s account as interest for the loan. Bothra’s sons had asked the hotel owner to pay 60 per cent of interest for the loan which Senthil transferred in several instalments.
“The trio had also got signatures of Senthil on blank bond papers which they later filled stating that Senthil had sold the hotel to them. Also, they demanded for `4.24 crore, within 10 days,” said an investigative officer.
Pressurised about giving money and constant threatening from the trio, on June 15, Senthil Ganapathy lodged a complaint with Chennai city police commissioner. CCB registered cases under various IPC sections including 420 (cheating), 465 (punishment for forgery) 467 (forgery of valuable security, will, etc) and 506 (II) (criminal intimidation).
It may be noted that Mukund had already been arrested by CCB on same charges of cheating a local resident in 2006. The officer said the financier had been lending money to people at high interest rates.