Four arrested for duping SBI of INR 40 lakh by forged NSCs

Kolkata, Jan. 14 (IANS): Four persons have been arrested from the city and its nearby areas for allegedly duping the SBI of INR 40 lakh which they obtained as loan by submitting forged National Savings Certificates (NSC) as collateral, a police officer said on Tuesday.

Acting on a complaint filed in July the previous year by the Regional Manager of State Bank of India’s zone office here, personnel from the Shakespeare Sarani Police station on Monday night picked up one of the accused from Falta in neighbouring South 24 Parganas district, while two others were arrested from the city hub Esplanade and another from Dum Dum in North 24 Parganas district.

All four have been charged under various provisions of the Indian Penal Code including criminal conspiracy, cheating and forgery.

As per the complaint lodged by RM Sandip Chowbey, the accused persons produced 60 National Savings Certificates (NSC) each of INR 1 lakh face value to the bank and obtained a term loan of INR 18 lakh and overdraft of INR 22 lakh, and siphoned of the money.

“Later, it was found all the 60 NSCs were forged and manufactured,” said city police’s Joint Commissioner (Crime) Murlidhar Sharma.

The verification process of such collateral securities was also intercepted by the alleged fraudsters to dupe the bank, Sharma said.

The police were also looking into the role played by the branch manager and the postal department.

“The roles of then branch manager and the postal department are also not beyond doubt, is being verified,” he said.

The police also seized 60 NSCs of face value INR 10,000 each and 84 Kisan Vikas Patras (KVP) of face value INR 50,000 each from the accused.

“All these NSCs and KVPs are manufactured. It seems that they were planning to dupe some other bank with those forged securities,” said Sharma.