Mumbai: Four men were booked for cheating an Airoli-based bank of Rs 72 lakh on the pretext of procuring a car loan from a private bank. The accused men had approached Axis Bank through a financial services institution and obtained a loan for cars, which already had unpaid loan due on them.
The scam came to light after the accused people stopped paying the loan instalments. Airoli Police have booked them under relevant sections of the Indian Penal Code for cheating.
According to the police, three men -- Sureshkumar Raju Palani, Atulkumar Sarabhai Parekh and Sunil Nenaram Choudhari -- had taken car loans from the Axis Bank’s Airoli branch. All three made the payments in a non-uniform manner.
From June 2018, Palani, Parekh and Choudhari stopped making the car loans payments. After their names were reflected in the loan defaulters list, the recovery department of Axis Bank contacted the trio separately and asked them to make the payments.
However, when contacted, they flatly refused to make any further payments and asked the bank officials to contact Pinnacle Financial Services.
The bank officials then initiated an inquiry and learned that the trio had approached Axis Bank for car loans through Umesh Udeshi-run Pinnacle Financial Services.
The enquiry also revealed that Udeshi helped them get loans for their cars by submitting the relevant documents. Udeshi’s Pinnacle Financial helped Palani procure a loan of Rs 14.23 lakh to buy a second-hand Innova car (DB-05-TN-3535),
Parekh procure a loan of Rs 41.22 lakh to buy a second-hand Mercedes car (MH-04-HF-9829) and Choudhari procure a loan of Rs 16.77 lakh for a second-hand Fortuner car (MH-46-AI-8111).
During a detailed inquiry, it was revealed that Udeshi had forged the documents like RC book and cheated the bank by stating that the second-hand vehicles had no previous loans unpaid.
After this revelation was made, the manager of the Fraud Control Unit of the Axis Bank approached Airoli Police and reported the incident. Police said this is a straightforward scam to dupe banks by taking loans and having no intention of repaying it completely.
“Udeshi was the direct sale agent at the dealer, from where the accused trio had bought second-hand cars. He seems to be the kingpin in the scam and we are investigating the matter further. Appropriate action will be taken as and when the investigation proceeds,” said an inspector from Airoli police station.
