Bank staff held for swindling gold worth Rs 2.46 crore

In another case, the police unearthed a racket that was involved in availing of vehicle loans from a nationalised bank using forged documents. Three persons were arrested, while a hunt is on to nab two more.

In the first case, sleuths from the Chennai City Crime Branch arrested J Jayaprakash (32), who was heading the gold loan division of the bank, and K Gunasekharan, another staff in the same branch of the bank. Jayaprakash is a native of Erode while Gunasekharan hails from Kattankulathur in Kancheepuram.

The fraud came to light when Jayaprakash was transferred to another branch and a new officer assumed charge. Sources said Jayaprakash failed to hand over the pledged gold and the documents linked to it. This prompted the senior executives of the bank to launch a probe. That is when it was revealed that Jayaprakash, along with Gunasekharan, had swindled the gold belonging to the customers to lead a luxurious life. They had taken the gold pledged by 33 customers and replaced it with fake gold ornaments.

In another bank fraud case, CCB sleuths arrested three persons of a five-member gang that availed car loan from a nationalised bank in Vepery of Rs 65 lakh using fake documents. After availing the loan, the five failed to repay the loan after. Following this, which a bank official lodged a police compliant.

During the probe, the police found that all the five had submitted fake documents related to salary certificate, bank statement, PAN card and Income Tax details to obtain the loan. Police have arrested three men identified as K Murugavel (43) of Minjur, K Varadarajan from Mylapore and A Bazullah Khan (49) of Ambattur.

Police said it was Varadarajan who had arranged fake documents for the other suspects, and added that they were on the lookout for two more men suspected to be linked to the case.