Mumbai: How smooth operator behind Rs 1K-cr scam duped investors

Annu Kapoor with his wife Anupama and three sons

Someone we trusted betrayed us. It will never be easy to trust someone again with our money," says Bollywood actor Annu Kapoor, who is among thousands of victims of Ritz Consultancy's Amber Dalal, who went incommunicado on March 14.

Dalal and Kapoor are residents of different buildings in Oshiwara's Windermere, a huge complex with multiple towers. Kapoor said he learned about Ritz via his sister and friends, who claimed they were getting two per cent returns per month. Lured by this, he started investing with Dalal in 2016 and started getting prompt monthly returns. This in turn convinced Kapoor's entire family to invest in Ritz.

Flat no. 103 at Windermere complex, Oshiwara, Andheri West, is owned by Amber and Alpana Dalal

"My mother Anuradha Patel, and our sons Kavan and Maahir, and even I invested in Ritz till 2023. In all, our family invested over Rs 1 crore with Dalal," said Kapoor's wife Anupama. Despite such unusually high returns (24 per cent per annum), the family did not find Dalal suspicious.

Building trust

"Amber had impressive communication skills and had mastered the art of gaining people's confidence through his actions," said Kapoor. "He used to enter into a proper Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the investor on a 500-rupee stamp paper, saying the essential commodity investment is comparatively risk-free, and that he will hand over a signed cheque for the principal amount, which was sufficient for gaining trust of the investor," he added.

Asked if the cheques were dated, Kapoor said the date field was left blank, "so that the validity of the cheque is maintained." "Moreover, between the 10th and 12th of every month, the returns would be credited, so nobody doubted him," said Kapoor.

Kapoor was one of the few investors who Dalal dealt with directly. His son Mithil managed most of the other investors and handled the back office. The magnitude of the scam may run into over Rs 1,000 crore, as Amber had offices in Dubai, US, etc for many non-resident Indian (NRI) investors, including professionals like chartered accountants, advocates, doctors and film industry folk.

Returns stopped

The Kapoors are also worried about many elderly retired people, including single mothers and widows, who had invested their life's savings with Dalal and were managing their monthly expenses from the returns, which have stopped.

Unfortunately for the Kapoors, this is not the first time they have been duped. Last year, Anupama's bag with foreign currency was snatched by bag-lifters near Paris. In 2022, a new recruit at Kapoor's office vanished with the cash he was asked to withdraw from the bank. "I have personally met senior officials at Oshiwara police station and at the Economic Offences Wing (EOW), and I hope that they soon apprehend the accused, as with every passing day, the chance of Dalal misappropriating our funds gets higher," said Kapoor.

‘Victims of greed'

Kapoor admitted they have become victims of their own greed and it would not be easy for the family to trust anyone with their money any more.

Another investor, requesting anonymity, said, "I know many who, with their families and distant relatives, invested from R1 crore to over Rs 50 crore. They are all maintaining silence. Most of them had put in their life's savings and some depended on the monthly returns for everyday expenses. I have been pushed back by
20 years in my life. My family (father and sister) trusted my word and invested all their savings with Dalal. Somewhere deep inside me, I feel responsible for their losses."

Many investors are now in the dark about the probe and are ignorant about the legal process, relying solely on updates on a WhatsApp group of victims.

"Most either live out of Mumbai or in foreign countries and are apprehensive about the case, as the EOW have frozen around 36 bank accounts of Dalal. It is hence imperative that Mumbai police give prompt updates on the investigation," pointed out an investor.