Berhampur: The Baidyanathpur police in Ganjam district have arrested three persons for allegedly cheating six banks of around ₹24 lakh by pledging fake gold ornaments. The arrests were made on Thursday.
The accused have been identified as Abhinav Srivastava (26) of Mirzapur, Uttar Pradesh, Biswajit Kar of Sahadevkhunta in Balasore district, and Sheikh Manjur Ilai (30) of Aktapur. Police seized four fake gold bangles weighing 67 grams, two fake gold earrings weighing 12 grams, and 61.70 grams of melted silver from their possession.
According to police, the trio befriended P. Purushottam, a resident of Badkhandi in Hinjilikatu, while working at a shrimp processing factory in Kakinada, Andhra Pradesh. About 18 months ago, they reconnected with Purushottam in Berhampur and proposed setting up a shrimp processing factory in Andhra Pradesh. They convinced him to help raise funds by pledging gold ornaments in banks.
Purushottam opened bank accounts in the names of his relatives and, using the fake gold supplied by the accused, secured loans from several branches. He obtained ₹3.5 lakh from the Bank of Maharashtra in Berhampur, ₹3.5 lakh from Federal Bank at Tatabenz Chhak, and ₹3.35 lakh from Axis Bank in Hinjilikatu—all against fake ornaments. In total, he initially raised more than ₹10 lakh and handed it over to the accused.
Later, the trio returned with more fake ornaments, and Purushottam secured an additional ₹10 lakh in loans from Axis Bank in Mandiapalli, Bank of Maharashtra in Khodasing, and DCB Bank in Hinjilikatu. As a reward, they gave him two bangles, which turned out to be silver plated with gold when he tried exchanging them at a jewelry shop. Realizing the fraud, Purushottam filed a police complaint.
Police then laid a trap, asking Purushottam to call the accused back to Berhampur, where they were arrested.
The case has raised serious questions about gold verification procedures at banks, as the fake ornaments had been accepted by six different branches.
Notably, the loan tenure at one Axis Bank branch had expired, and the bank had already auctioned the pledged ornaments before detecting the fraud.
