25 April,2016 09:00 AM IST | | Samiullah Khan
The accused, a 24-year-old mobile company employee confessed to having duped several finance and money-lending firms for a total loan of Rs 3.67 lakh
Kundan Singh Parihar, the accused
A 24-year-old mobile company employee was arrested on Sunday for taking loans from various finance companies of Rs 3.67 lakh by mortgaging imitation jewellery. An accomplice of the accused is still at large.
Also read: Mumbai's Ocean's Six scammed jewellery stores using fake DDs
Kundan Singh Parihar, the accused
Crime Branch sources said the accused, Kundan Singh Parihar, a resident of Nalasopara, and his partner cheated money lending and finance firms by passing imitation jewellery off as real gold.
In March, Shah Sureshkumar Swarupaji, a money lending firm in Goregaon, loaned Parihar R60,000 against imitation jewellery. When after a month, nobody came for the jewellery, the firm owner Suresh Ganeshmal Jain, checked the ornaments and found that they were fake. He then filed a complaint on April 21 in Goregaon police station and Parihar was arrested by Crime Branch Unit XI yesterday near Ratnanagar in Goregaon.
This is not the first time Parihar has landed in the police net. After moving to Mumbai from his native place in Rajasthan in 2009, he had a brief stint at a ration shop in Thane. He left it for a job at a nearby jewellery shop, from where he stole 100 gram gold and fled to his native town.
He was arrested by Mumbra police and had to spend a few months in jail before he was bailed out in 2010.
He then began working for a mobile phone company as a document collecting agent but after meeting his partner in Nalasopara, they planned to dupe finance and money lending companies.
While Parihar was arrested for taking a Rs 60,000 loan against fake jewellery, he revealed he had done much more than that during interrogation.
Also read: Two Indian nationals jailed for fake jewellery scam
Parihar further revealed that he had duped several agencies in a similar manner - Muthoot Finance (Rs 70,000 from Borivali branch and Rs 30,000 from Vasai Branch), twice from Manappuram Finance Ltd's Dadar branch (Rs 81,000 and Rs 26,000) and Kavya Finance's Thane branch (Rs 1 lakh).
The accused further accepted that he had cheated many jewellers in the city too.Crime Branch officials recovered three Aadhaar cards, PAN card and driving licence with same photos from the accused and also receipts of ornaments mortgaged under different names.