Mumbai: The Economic Offences Wing (EOW) on Sunday arrested Rajeev Ranjan Pandey, a hotelier from Jharkhand, for his alleged involvement in the Rs 122 crore missing cash of New India Cooperative Bank. The Esplanade court remanded Pandey in police custody till March 28.
With this arrest, the number of accused persons put behind bars in this case stands at eight. “Before the fraud took place, Pandey (45), along with his cronies, met the bank’s arrested GM and head of accounts, Hitesh Mehta (57), and other arrested accused, Unnathan Arunbhai Arunachalam (57), at least thrice at different hotels in Mumbai and Pune. Arunachalam claimed that Pandey posed as a person who could bring a major company’s corporate social responsibility (CSR) team to channel cash into legitimate-looking financial transactions,” said a police officer.
The misappropriation of funds came to light on Feb 12 when RBI officials found Rs 122 crore cash missing. The fraud was going on since 2019.
Arunachalam told the police that he received a total of Rs 33 crore cash from Mehta and gave Rs 15 crore to Pandey. “Pandey told them that he would give this money to the company’s CSR team, who would add Rs 7 crore to it and transfer it through online payment to a trust’s account. From there, it would come back to the accused. An amount of Rs 15 crore would be kept in the bank, and the remaining would be distributed among all accused. However, according to Arunachalam, Pandey fled with the money,” said the police.
After Arunachalam was arrested from Vadodaralast week, police got the details of Pandey. Using technical intelligence, police found Pandey was running a hotel in Bokaro, Jharkhand. A police team landed up there. However, dozens of people gathered there, and Pandey gave police the slip and fled by train. The police questioned Pandey’s nephew and nabbed Pandey again within 12 hours. He was produced before a Jharkhand court, which granted Mumbai police a transit remand.
Meanwhile, Mehta and arrested builder Dharmesh Paun, who were taken into police custody on Mar 20, were sent to jail again on Mar 22. Mehta is scheduled to undergo a brain-mapping test at the state forensic lab this Friday