Ex Indian Navy staff arrested in Odisha capital in Rs 100cr scam

Bhubaneswar: A retired Indian Navy employee was today arrested in Odisha capital for his alleged complicity in duping people of nearly Rs 100 crore in the name of providing e-publishing jobs.

Capt (Retd) Nrusingh Prasad Patnaik was arrested today from here on charges of motivating people to deposit lakhs of money for home-based work provided by the company which turned out to be fake.

“An FIR has been registered. Some outside people are suspected to be involved in the scam. The person who had instigated youths to invest in it has been arrested today. We are on the lookout for other members involved in the case,” Bhubaneswar DCP Satyabrata Bhoi said.

The dubious Gurgaon-based company APS Solutions Pvt Ltd (All Process Source Solutions Private Limited) having its branch office in Ashok Nagar area here has shut its operations after allegedly collecting nearly Rs 100 crore from youths who were given various computer-based jobs on the promise of lucrative remuneration.

“I have deposited security deposit of over Rs 6.30 lakh with the APS Solutions Pvt Ltd in two instalments. I haven’t given any money to Nrusingh Prasad Patnaik. He promoted the company and claimed that he was the person to have brought it to Odisha. Besides, he also vouched for the Directors of the company,” a duped investor said.

Patnaik along with the Finance head Manoja Manjari Panda allegedly persuaded job seekers to invest to the tune of lakhs in exchange of jobs.

The company collected Rs 4 to Rs 8 lakh as security money from each individual depending on the type of work assigned to them. Over 500 youths have been cheated by the company, sources said.

“Manoja Manjari Panda came in my contact and asked me to transfer money to the account of APS Solutions Pvt Ltd. She assured me of all support and two-fold return against the investment,” a youth said.

While Raghavendra Singh Saluja is the Director of the company, Rajanikant Biswal was appointed as Manager and Nikhil Prakash as Head of Odisha operations respectively.

We are on the lookout for Manoja Manjari Panda, Raghavendra Singh Saluja, Rajanikant Biswal and Nikhil Prakash for their involvement in the fake jobwork scheme, police said.

The company on its Facebook page claimed that it deals in genuine IT/ITES and BPO/KPO projects having reputed listed companies in India and abroad.

As per APS Solutions Pvt Ltd, the company specializes in: Customer Support, E- publishing, XML conversion, Data Conversion, Form Processing/Filling, Scanning, HTML Tagging, Data mining/entry, Inbound & Outbound (Voice) Projects, Animation & Web Designing among others.