Patna, Bihar: A big financial fraud has been uncovered at the Bank of Baroda’s Khazanchi Road branch in Kadamkuan. The bank was defrauded of ₹1,59,66,000 by a customer who submitted fake employer details, fabricated bank statements, and documents representing properties that actually did not exist.
The loan account turned NPA and Bank officials visited the property mortgaged in the loan. The scam came to light when bank officials went to the site to inspect the mortgaged properties. During the inspection, no property linked to the loans could be identified. Even, the land documents that were mortgaged to the bank were missing.
Not only that, but the documents were also found to be fake. Branch manager Naveen Kumar filed an FIR against eight accused people. According to the complaint filed by the bank, this entire fraud was perpetrated between October 2022 and February 2023.
Naveen Kumar, a resident of Sarai in Muzaffarpur and currently the manager of Khajanchi Road branch, said that the accused, in collusion with other people, got crores of rupees sanctioned under the bank’s home loan scheme.
As soon as the loan amount was credited to the accounts, it was systematically transferred to savings accounts, and the money was withdrawn through RTGS.
The case has been filed against Chanda Devi, a resident of Khajpura (Airport police station) and her husband Dhananjay Kumar, who took Rs 32.28 lakh under home loan and another loan of Rs 3.71 lakh.
Apart from this, Vijay Kumar Chaudhary, resident of Chhoti Ranipur, Fatuha, took a home loan of Rs 47.40 lakh and another loan of Rs 3.67 lakh, Rekha Devi of Patna City (Alamganj police station) took a home loan of Rs 40 lakh and a top-up loan of Rs 4.50 lakh and Dinesh Kumar Chaudhary, resident of Simli Murarpur, Patna City, took a home loan of about Rs 50 lakh.
Kanchan Kumari, resident of Ranjodha, Banka and Gautam Gambhir, resident of Kurkuri, Patna played the main role as Direct Selling Agents (DSA) in carrying out this entire fraud.
The most shocking thing that came to light in the case was that the responsibility of physically verifying the documents and lands of the applicants before sanctioning the loan was given to MS Crux Risk Management Private Limited (CPV Agency) located in Ranjit Nagar, Delhi.
Without knowing the ground reality, the agency prepared fake verification reports and submitted them to the bank, based on which loan files were approved. When the accounts became NPAs and bank officials conducted physical inspections, they discovered that the mortgaged land did not exist.
Normally, the property is verified by the loan officer who sanctions the loan. In this case, why the property was verified by a private company remains a mystery.
The bank subsequently launched an internal investigation and officially declared it a suspected fraud on December 1, 2023. The branch manager clarified that all original documents related to the fraud are safe with the bank and are being handed over to the police for investigation.
