Six arrested in Rs 16.71 crore loan fraud case in Odisha

Bhubaneswar, Sep 5 (IANS) Six people have been arrested in connection with a bank loan fraud of Rs 16.71 crore in Odisha, the Economic Offences Wing (EOW) sources said.

The accused have been identified as Anirban Patnaik and Anupama Dash from Bhubaneswar, Tophan Rout and Satyaban Rout from Khandapada in Nayagarh district, Tukuna Mallick from Badamba in Cuttack district and Feroz Khan from the Kakatpur area of Puri district.

Based on a complaint by Shiba Sundara Sahoo, Regional Manager, State Bank of India, Bhubaneswar, the EOW launched an investigation after registering a case on August 12.

Sahoo alleged that the accused persons availed 161 Xpress Credit Loans worth Rs 16.71 crore from different branches of the SBI in Bhubaneswar from November 2022 to October 2023 by producing fake and fabricated employment records as employees of PhonePe Pvt. Ltd.

The EOW, during the investigation, found that the accused Anirbana had taken a building on rent at DLF, Patia, Bhubaneswar to run the office of his company ‘Purvi Venture Pvt. Ltd’.

However, he along with other accused hatched a conspiracy and projected the building as the regional office of PhonePe at Bhubaneswar by putting the sign boards and stickers of PhonePe, added the EOW sources.

They also created a fake e-mail like PhonePe and visited different branches of SBI at Bhubaneswar for Xpress Credit Loan (Personal Loan), meant for corporate sectors, by filing the inflated salary slip and the forged employment certificate of PhonePe.

It also came to the fore that the accused used to receive 35 per cent of the loan amount from the loanees to get it sanctioned in their favour. The fake e-mail was being used to give the false information that the accused were the employees of PhonePe.

“Amounts were sent in advance for 3-4 consecutive months to the accounts of the loanees on a particular date of a month to give the impression that it happens to be the salary account of the loanees where regular salaries are being credited every month,” said EOW sources.

The SBI stumbled upon the multi-crore loan fraud during an internal inquiry in the bank.

PhonePe in its statement said, “It has recently come to the knowledge of PhonePe Private Limited (“PhonePe”) that certain persons have been arrested by the Economics Offenses Wing of the Odisha Police for falsely representing themselves as employees of PhonePe to avail loans from State Bank of India under fraudulent pretense. At the outset, PhonePe unequivocally states that the arrested persons are in no way associated with PhonePe or its employees at any point of time. Such persons have never been employed by the company and that any documents in relation to PhonePe used by such persons are forged documents. PhonePe is a law-abiding organization and has been cooperating and working closely with the Economic Offenses Wing of the Odisha Police and State Bank of India to aid their investigation. We shall continue to do as and when called upon. Needless to state, PhonePe condemns the actions by such persons for their unauthorized and illegal use of PhonePe’s brand and goodwill.”

–IANS

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