Chennai couple, finance firm manager held for multi-crore fraud

CHENNAI: The Central Crime Branch (CCB) of Chennai Police have arrested a couple and a former manager with Repco Home Finance limited for defrauding the finance firm of several crores by fraud.

The same couple is also accused of duping two other persons of Rs 9.19 crore, police said. CCB registered a case based on a complaint from a senior executive at Repco Home Finance Limited.

In 2016, the couple, Sasikala and Devendran of Anna Nagar, had approached Repco’s Anna Nagar branch and obtained two mortgage loans totalling Rs 3 crore by pledging original documents of eight houses on September 29, 2016.

During an audit in 2026, Repco found the original documents missing.

Investigation revealed that while Rs 2.26 crore loan was still pending, Anna Nagar Branch manager RG Harinath Karthik had issued a fake receipt showing full repayment and cancelled the mortgage.

The couple then pledged the same documents in another private bank and obtained Rs 21 crore.

In two other cases, the same couple cheated N Navaneeth of a real estate firm of Rs 6.19 crore after taking his property documents on the pretext of business development and obtaining a third-party collateral loan.

They also cheated another businessman of Rs 3 crore by giving him unregistered agreement of already sold houses.

After investigations, a police team arrested the accused, Devendran (51), his wife Sasikala (43), and Harinath Karthik (51) of Perungudi. All three were produced before a magistrate and remanded to judicial custody.