The East Zone Police in Hyderabad had caught an HMDA funds diversion racket and arrested a three-member gang, including an HMDA employee on Friday. It is said to be that the trio had cheated HMDA to the tune of a big amount Rs. 5.87 crores. The trio was identified as L. Shankar, Y. Vijaya Mohan Krishna and Raju Ahmed.
The prime accused L. Shankar 39, works as a field officer at Sai Security Services, an outsourcing agency of HMDA. In 2008, he tampered with the first cheque of the company, changing the figures and words.
“He made 1 to 7 and 1 to 14, altered the amount written in words and deposited the forged cheque in a fake account created in the name of Sai Security services at Allahabad bank,” DCP East Zone Dr. V. Ravinder said.
Shankar made his associate Raju Ahmed to open fake accounts in various banks to deposit forged cheques in the accounts. One of the Accounts officer Vijay Mohan Krishna noticed the fraud later he also joined them and became a group of fraudsters. Mohan Krishna was paid around Rs 85 lakhs as his share.
According to the reports, Shankar’s gang cheated HMDA to the tune of Rs 5.87 crores from 2008-09 to 2015-16. Police recovered Rs 5.02 crore, procured using the misappropriated funds, including Rs 9.75 lakh cash, gold worth about Rs 8 lakh, land documents worth around Rs 3.73 crore, cars, insurance certificates and around 233.5 grams silver articles from Shankar and Rs 20.79 lakh cash and two residential plots worth Rs 25 lakh from HMDA employee Mohan Krishna.