Daijiworld Media Network - Bengaluru (MS)

Bengaluru, Mar 11: Vidhan Soudha police have unearthed a huge scam that runs into several crores of rupees of forging the cheques and arrested six people including a retired government official.

G S Sripad, retired government employee, Ananda Thirtha, son of Sripad, Harish, underworld elements Prashanth, Prathap and Venkatesh are the arrested accused who are alleged to have amassed several crore rupees in the scam. The kingpin of the scam Naveen and his accomplice Rajesh Shetty are absconding and the police are on the lookout for them.

Sripad, a resident of Thyagarajanagar in the city used to do the work of getting the cheques cleared after his retirement against commission. Many people started taking the help of Sripad in getting their cheques cleared. Ananda Thirtha, son of Sripad, who is an employee of a private company also helped him in this service.

Harish, one of the accused gave a cheque from AKCT Chidambaram Cotton Mill Pvt Ltd to Anand asking him to clear the same for commission. Anand gave this cheque to his father Sripad in order to clear the same from SBI's Vidhana Soudha branch.

The cheque was originally written for an amount of Rs 57,750. This amount was changed to Rs 5,77,500 and presented to the bank by Sripad. The manager of the bank, Ashok Ramamurthy got suspicion on the cheque and promptly filed a complaint with the Vidhana Soudha police.

The main culprits of the act are Naveen, Venkatesh, Prathap and Prashanth who were together in the Parappana Agrahara prison for some other crimes. After obtaining bail, they got the idea of forging the cheques. Naveen, the kingpin had the knowledge of banking procedure and knew how to forge the cheques that cannot be traced by even the bank personnel. According to police, Naveen is the one who wooed other members into the crime.

The accused members of the gang used to have a chat with courier boys and steal the cheques from them after diverting their attention. Then they used to change the amount on the cheque and present the same in bank for clearance.