Bhubaneswar: Four persons accused of duping investors of crores were arrested Monday by the Commissionerate Police here.
The accused — identified as Sk Ganeshan,53, from Chennai in Tamil Nadu, Jayadeep Kulkarni,43, from Baroda in Gujarat, Naveen, 32, of Coimbatore in Tamil Nadu and N Naren, 33, from Bidyanarayanpur in Karnataka — were arrested after a written complaint was lodged by one of the victims.
The victim, identified as Rajesh Kumar Patra, is a resident of College Square area in Cuttack. Patra and some of his friends develop software and were also in the digital marketing training in Cuttack and Bhubaneswar.
In February, he came in contact with Ganeshan through a WhatsApp group on online investment. Later, Ganeshan goaded Patra into arranging a meeting in Odisha where he would make presentations about trading in the share markets of the USA and other countries. He promised that the investors would make a lucrative sum of money every month. He had claimed that they would get around 300 per cent returns on their investments in the shares trading.
He also told them that he would exchange the money invested in his sham security broker firm, Capital xm, into foreign currencies and invest it in shares and debentures in the share markets all over the world. Lured by his promises, Patra agreed to arrange some meetings in the Capital.
Later, Ganeshan stayed at an apartment at Pokhoriput area under the Airfield Police station limits. During his stay, Ganeshan had collected a hefty sum of money from many persons who attended the meetings.
Similarly, Patra deposited Rs 7 lakhs in his firm. Ganeshan also claimed himself to being the owner of a sanitary equipment manufacturing unit in Tamil Nadu. Ganeshan collected another Rs 10 lakhs from Patra on the pretext of availing him for selling the sanitary products at a very cheap rate in the state.
However, he left for Chennai claiming his relative was dead. The cheque given by Ganeshan bounced due to insufficient balance.
Later, Patra laid a trap with the help of his friend to bring Ganeshan back. Ganeshan could not resist the offer of meeting some more investors and returned. This time he came along with three other aides. Patra and his friend booked a room at Hotel Kharavela for the meeting and at the same time also informed the Kharavela Nagar police.
Patra and his friend had requested some of their mutual friends to attend the meeting as investors on Sunday. Meanwhile, police raided the place and arrested all the culprits. Police seized three laptops and foreign currencies from them. They were sent to judicial custody after being produced before the court Monday.