The Commissionerate Police on Tuesday arrested a former assistant manager of a bank in Bhubaneswar on charges of issuing loan against the fixed deposit of a customer. The accused, Meena Naik was arrested based on the complaint filed by the victim, identified as Hrushikesh Bhujabal (62), a retired government employee.
A senior police official said that Naik’s arrest was subsequent to a raid jointly conducted by the Anti-Fraud Cell and Bharatpur Police.
As per reports, the complainant had transferred Rs 10 lakh (retirement money) to Andhra Bank (now Union Bank) at Kalinga Nagar (Ghatikia Branch) sometime back. He had kept the money in fixed deposit (FD) on October 16, 2021.
It is alleged that the (former) Assistant Manager of the bank used the fixed deposit of the complainant to sanction loan amounting to Rs 7 lakh. The loan amount was transferred to different bank accounts.
Bhubaneswar DCP, Umashankar Dash said, “The concerned bank official without the knowledge of the customer had used his fixed deposit as a surety to sanction a loan of Rs 7 lakh. The money was subsequently transferred to the bank account of the relatives of the concerned official.”
Dash said that the concerned bank official had cheated over Rs 1 crore belonging to some 6 to 7 other customers too. After the irregularity was detected during audit, action was taken against the concerned official who then returned some amount.
“Though some amount was returned, we are conducting further investigation into the matter. We will register separate cases if we receive complaints from other customers in connection with that fraud,” Dash added.
From the bank audit report, it was ascertained that Naik had misappropriated Rs 116.87 lakh public money using fixed deposits, pension account and gold loan accounts of several customers by carrying out fraudulent transactions.