Times of India: Mumbai Police arrests 18 in the Rs15 crore payment fraud
Moneylife Digital Team 09 May 2018
Mumbai Police have reportedly arrested about 18 people following a complaint by a senior editor from Times of India (ToI), who allegedly signed and cleared cheques to the tune of a whopping  Rs15 crore over five years, ostensible in the names of fictitious persons, based on vouchers put up to him by a secretary, who has been accused of the payment fraud. Derick D'sa, who is Editor of the newspaper's Mumbai edition has filed the complaint. It would appear from the complaint that Mr D’sa had signed well over 1,000 of these fake vouchers ostensibly in the names of the freelancers and contributors, without bothering to read what he had signed. The matter was finally spotted by the auditors, say sources.
 
In a statement Mr D'sa said, "Amit Mayekar, one of my secretaries, handled payments to part-time contributors to the newspaper and used to take his signature on invoices. Last week, I was informed by some of the accounts department persons that some of the invoices forwarded by Mayekar looked suspicious. I asked my editorial team and the accounts team to investigate and have found that 78 persons to whom the contributions for writing the articles have been made since January 2013 have never ever written any article for ToI anywhere in the country."
 
According to reports, Police have filed a first information report (FIR) and so far have arrested 18 people, who have received money in their bank accounts from the newspaper. These 78 fake contributors have received about Rs20lakh to Rs38 lakh during the past five years from Benett Coleman and Co Ltd, the owner of the newspaper. Mayekar, however, is absconding. 
 
Here is the statement submitted by Mr D'sa to Azad Maidan Police Station...
 
 
 
Comments
OMNAMAHSHIVAY
6 years ago
ATTENTION PLEASE !!!⚠️
IMPORTANT ANOUNCEMENT!!! ⚠️⬇️
FRAUD FRAUD FRAUD ⚠️⬇️Hello guys
There is a fraud that is in trending on OLX.
I am a Victim of this Fraud so I am writing this to aware you guys.
If you have posted an add to sell your CAR on OLX, there is a chance that a fraud name “Vishal Pandey” aka ”Tarakeshwar Gorakhnath Pandey” might contact you, he might show interest to buy your car asap.
He might say that he is manager in ICICI bank Nalasopara west branch.
He might come to inspect your car and will finalize it in 10 mins without doing much bargain .
He will say that he will pay you via Demand Draft. As he is working in bank they are allowed to pay via DD or Bankers Cheque. He will ask for your account details to prepare a DD / Bankers Cheque.
If you have a loan on your car he will say he will visit the branch and pay off the loan and rest he will pay in the form of Demand Draft.
If you do not have loan on your car he might pay you certain token amount Via NEFT and rest he will pay you via Demand Draft or Bankers Cheque.
Later he will insist you to give an instant car delivery and ask you for Original Document along with Transfer form and Insurance Copy.
If you agree with him that thinking you had given you a demand Draft (In my case I agreed)& Complete the Formalities . His associates will record the entire process of signing the transfer paper and handing over the car & Keep that as Evidence for future. They will take delivery, signing the Delivery note and would whats app you Addhar Card & Pan Card & take yours.
Now when you visit your bank next day to Deposit DD, your bank might inform you that, this is not a DD instead it is a Normal Cheque of a Saving Account. When you call him and Enquire about the same he will say the cheque belong to his maternal uncle, and it will clear do not worry you can deposit the cheque. When you deposit the Cheque it will get returned stating Signature mismatch or Funds Insufficient.
When you approach Tarakeshwar Pandey, He will give you another cheque which will get dishonored stating that’s Funds insufficient. & later he might give you few more cheques which will get dishonored in the same way. None of his cheque gets cleared. ( If you see his bank statement you will notice cheque in series are getting dishonored, there are no funds in his account still he is issuing cheques)
He might also send you some Fake Screenshot of NEFT. These are Queued Transaction (Standing Instructions) which never get credited to your account.
He might also share Screenshot of YES Bank to prove he has balance in Lacs . ( He would deposit cheque for eg: 500 000/- from his Federal Bank which might have balance of 100/- to his YES bank when the cheque comes for clearing at Yes bank it will display Ledger balance of 500000/- in his YES Bank account. He will take screenshot of it and will share that with every one stating he has balance in his account and will give fake promises.)
All the cheques used for these transactions are from Federal bank Malad West & Thane Manpada Branch & Yes Bank.
He will keep answering all your call and will make fake promises.
He use all this tricks just to consume time, and meanwhile his associate car dealer would sell that car to any third party. (If your car gets transferred you cannot get your car back)
And when you approach the legal system they might tell you this is 138 case of cheque bounce and you need to do it via civil court. When you approach Civil court you have to pay Case fees as well hire advocate and it generally takes around 3 - 6 years for the 138 case to get resolved.
You might not be able to File an FIR or take any Legal Action. Hence you need to rely on fake promises.
Till the time you rely on fake promises. Your car is sold to a third party usually outside states, so it’s very difficult to trace the car.
He does not have a fix address where he can be traced.
The modus operandi of this Crime is to give fake cheques and sell the car outside Maharashtra mainly in UP.

If you have been victim of this type of fraud please contact local authority as soon as possible.
This is a big racket and needs to be exposed.
Many people from Vasai, Nalasopara, Mulund, Thane, Andheri are Victim of this fraud.

I will soon share Contact & Gang members Details of this Fraud.

Tarakeshwar Pandey #Tarakeshwar_Pandey #Tarakeshwar_Gorakhnath_Pandey #Tarakeshwar_Panday #Vishal_Pandey #OLX #OLX_FRAUD #MUMBAI_FRAUD
Raghuram J C
7 years ago
It is utter professional disregard towards his responsibility on the part of the Editor. Professional conduct begs him to resign immediately.

There are few teams which behaves as if they are an elite creed and does not heed either to functional ethics or Corporate gifts and gratuity policy.
Veeresh Malik
7 years ago
This is often a normal practice in some types of companies, fake voucher payments, with full knowledge of the owners. Looks like a whole lot of go-betweens will be in trouble here. List of names of those arrested is not available as yet?
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