Bhubaneswar: The Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of Odisha Crime Branch arrested a fraudster from neighbouring Chhattisgarh on July 1 for cloning a few cheques of Bank of India (BOI), the face value of which is around a total of Rs 9.6 Crore.

The trickster has been identified as Ghanshyam Ahuja alias Rocky Kingrani (30), son of Late Gopi Chand Ahuja from Telibandha in Rabigram of Raipur in Chhattisgarh. He is a resident of Chatapara in Tilaknagar under Civil Line police limits in Bilaspur of Chhattisgarh.

Following the arrest, the man was produced before CJM Court in Bilaspur of Chhattishgarh and was brought to Bhubaneswar on the strength of transit remand in EOW PS case (No-05, dt.19.04.2024, U/s 419/420/467/468/471/120-B of the IPC.

The arrested will be produced before Court of PO and Designated Court under OPID Act, Balasore later today. Investigation of the case is underway.

According to a source, the case was registered by taking over Bhanjapur PS (Mayurbhanj district) case No-95, dated 19.04.2024 which was registered on the written allegation of Bank of India’s Baripada Branch chief manager Sujata Kanungo that illegal transactions of Rs 9,56,76,600 has been made from the account of District Mineral Foundation (DMF) Trust of Zilla Parishad, Mayurbhanj maintained with the bank by producing four cheques on April 10 and April 18, 2024.

During a detailed probe, it was ascertained that the savings account of zilla parishad in Mayurbhanj is being maintained with Bank of India, Baripada branch in the name of DDMF Trust. The fraudsters by producing forged and cloned cheques managed to transfer Rs 9,56,76,600 in total to two different accounts in the name of PT Constructions & Suppliers (Rs 2,68,42,300) maintained with Bank of Maharashtra and to SK Enterprises (Rs 1,84,27,400) maintained with Punjab & Sindh Bank.

The above mentioned amounts were found further diverted or transferred to many other accounts from the accounts of PT Constructions & Suppliers and SK Enterprises. Out of the illegally transferred amount, Rs 5,04,06,900 was blocked and Rs 13,56,948 lying in 33 accounts have been frozen.

Accused Ghanshyam is the owner and proprietor of Ahuja & Associates and also the signatory authority of the firm’s bank account. It was also found that an amount of Rs 63,69,601 has been transferred from the account of PT Construction to the account of Ahuja & Associates, and an amount of Rs 11.60 Lakh was withdrawn from the account by accused Ghanshyam, who transferred the rest amount to different other accounts.

The arrested man is a B.Com pass out but posing as a CA having office at Raipur in connivance with other accused persons. He allowed his account maintained with IDBI Bank for diversion of the fraud amount.

After EOW suspected foul play in this case, Ghanshyam fled from his native place in Raipur and hid himself in a rented house in Bilaspur, and managed to have another Aadhaar card in the fake name of Rakesh Kingrani with nick name Rocky.

The accused is a member of a larger gang having a complex network in Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Jharkhand, West Bengal, and Odisha.

Notably, EOW has got important clues about the entire gang. They have been perpetrating similar frauds and scams for the last four years in an organised manner by using clone cheques, multi-layering of money transfers, sometimes using mule accounts, and by manipulating information networks etc.

Many incriminating materials such as a laptop, two mobiles, three pen drives suspected to be containing vital clues, and ATM cards have been seized from the arrested Ghanshyam.

Another accused in the case named Pomesh Tembhare, proprietor of PT Constructions & Suppliers, was earlier and is still in judicial custody.