Mumbai: Former IRS officer, wife booked for cheating

Mumbai: The Malabar Hill police have registered a case of cheating against ex-Indian Revenue Service (IRS) officer Vivek Batra. Garment trader Bipin Aggarwal, 52, complained to the Malabar Hill police that Batra got him to invest in his wife's company and he lost the entire amount. A case has been registered against four people including Batra and his wife Priyanka.

Batra cheated Agarwal of Rs 48 lakh

Batra allegedly cheated Agarwal of Rs 48 lakh. Prior to this, the CBI registered a case of disproportionate assets against Batra, while he was forced into early retirement due to the corruption cases against him. According to the police, Aggarwal got acquainted with Batra in 2005 and had outsourced work to his wife who is a clothing designer. Later, Batra got him to invest Rs 57 lakh in his wife's real estate business which was paid via 13 installments.

Batra asked Agarwal to invest more but he refused as there was no paperwork for the investments made. A year later, Agarwal asked Priyanka to return his investment amount as he didn't receive any profits and was assured he would get back his money. He also sent a legal notice to Batra in 2009 as the money was not returned. Batra then returned Rs7 lakh.

Agarwal later found out about the disproportionate assets case against Batra

In 2013, Batra gave Rs 2 lakh to Agarwal and assured him this the rest of the money will be returned soon. Then in 2017, Agarwal got to know from the news that the CBI has registered a disproportionate assets case against Batra. At the time he asked Batra for the money again.

In 2019, Agarwal got to know from the news that Batra has been fired by the Government of India and was convinced that he had been cheated. When he tried to extract details of Priyanka's company, he got to know that it had been sold by her in 2005 to Prakash Singh Rana and Sameer Nate. The ownership rights of the payment that Agarwal made were with Rana and Nate.