Mom held for role in Rs 4.8 crore fraud

The Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of the Mumbai Police arrested a 50-year-old woman whose son worked for Hiranandani Group in Powai and allegedly duped them of Rs 4.88 crore.

While probing the money trail in the case, in which FIR was registered in January 2015, the EOW led by joint commissioner Dhananjay Kamlakar learnt that Anita, mother of accused Rahul Thakur (30), had withdrawn some part of the swindled money with her signature. The EOW probed further and after getting a few more evidences she was placed under arrest recently. The Asian Age had first reported the arrest of Thakur, in October last year.

Probe into the case began in January 2015 after an FIR was registered alleging forgery, cheating and criminal breach of trust under the IPC. The Hiranandani Group had given a private company the contract for advertising. But Thakur allegedly told his seniors that the private company was charging them way too much and he knew a company that could deliver the same quality of work at a far lesser price.

Thakur then allegedly floated the company the same month with his gym trainer Siddhesh Kadam as the company’s director. Kadam got Rs 30,000 a month just to sign papers. Thakur worked in the Hiranandani group since 2013 and drew a salary of Rs 1.15 lakh a month. The group also told the EOW that he had lied on his resume about his work experience and also about having a degree from Switzerland in order to bag the lucrative job.

The EOW in the course of investigation for making recovery in the case has learnt that the accused Thakur has splurged money on women in dance bars. Moreover, the accused is said to be addicted to drugs and to have spent lakhs of rupees on a luxurious lifestyle. Senior inspector of EOW unit III, Prabhakar Loke said that Anita withdrew Rs 7 lakh using her PAN card. Further, she was present with her son while taking delivery of the Jaguar car worth Rs 60 lakh.