BHUBANESWAR : The Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of Crime Branch on Monday arrested four persons for allegedly duping the State Bank of India (SBI) of a whopping Rs 8.10 crore by availing loans in favour of ineligible people through fake documents.
The accused were identified as Smruti Ranjan Sethy, M Dibyashree Jyoti Ranjan from Jagatsinghpur, and Niranjan Behera and Debasish Behera from Nayapalli in Bhubaneswar.
EOW launched an investigation basing on the complaint of the regional branch manager of SBI Bhubaneswar, Shiba Sundar Sahoo. He had alleged that the accused had arranged ineligible loanees and availed 234 Xpress credit loans amounting to Rs 8.10 crore from the bank’s Jaydev Vihar and Damana Square branches by producing their fake employment documents between November, 2021 and January, 2023.
EOW officials said the fraudsters impersonated as employees of different organisations like Capital Trust limited, Corporate Infotech Private Limited, Falcon Marine Exports Limited, G4S Secure Solutions Private Limited, Global Innovsource Solutions, Innovsource Services Private Limited, Muthoot Microfin Limited, Narayana Hrudayalaya Limited, Orion Security Services Solutions Private Limited and others.
The accused managed to avail loans in favour of 234 ineligible people by producing fake/fabricated documents like salary certificates, employment details, bank statements and KYC. Though the loanees deposited the installments initially, they later stopped making any payments. The loan accounts turned into non-performing assets (NPA) and currently the outstanding balance stands at more than Rs 4.77 crore.
“During investigation, it was established that Rs 19.08 lakh, Rs 2.42 lakh, Rs 94,000 and Rs 50,000 were transferred to the accounts of accused Smruti, M Dibyashree, Niranjan and Debashis respectively from the loan accounts. The four acted as middlemen and prepared fake documents of ineligible loanees to make wrongful financial gains,” said an EOW official.
One laptop and five mobile phones were seized from them. Further probe is underway, he added.