Hyderabad: Hyderabad CCS police uncovered that the kingpin of the fraud is a major suspect Saikumar, who played a key role in the Telugu Akademi Fund Scam case, along with his followers has looted nearly Rs 200 crore in the last 10 years.
Saikumar and 8 others have been remanded to custody in connection with the Rs 64.5 crores scam by Nampally court on Tuesday.
Saikumar's team, which focuses on the real estate business learned about the Telugu Akademi funding a year ago. Realizing that the supervision of superiors would not be so strict, Saikumar changed his plan accordingly. This time he met the bank managers directly and persuaded them to pay a commission. He looted Rs 64.05 crores in various forms. Police found that he has usurped Rs 200 crores in toto and are investigating it further.
Police suspect misappropriation of Rs 40 crores in AP Housing Board, Rs 15 crores in Pollution Control Board, Rs 45 crores in Minority Welfare Department, and Rs 15 crore in AP Seeds Corporation. The police were engaged in gathering adequate evidence to this extent. CCS police are investigating whether there is anyone else behind the Saikumar gang.
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According to Hyderabad Police Commissioner Anjani Kumar, the kingpin in the fraud - Saikumar - is a real estate businessman from Tanuku in Andhra Pradesh. He is also accused in three similar cases in the past. Saikumar pulled off the operation by enlisting the support of the bank staff and the Akademi.
The Akademi's accounts in-charge, S Ramesh, would issue cheques to the bank for conversion into term deposits. The bank staff would divert the money into others' accounts and issue fake fixed deposit certificates in return for payment of kickbacks.
Ramesh would show these certificates to his higher-ups, who were under the impression that they were genuine. The bank staff invested their share of the booty in properties and some had even begun money lending businesses. Saikumar himself pocketed a lion’s share of the embezzled funds from them.
The arrested persons are Akademi Accounts in-charge S Ramesh, Chandanagar Canara Bank branch manager M Sadhana, realtor Saikumar, Somasekhar, Venkateswara Rao, Venkataraman, Union Bank of India chief manager Mastan Vali, AP Mercantile Cooperative Credit Society chairman Satyanarayana Rao, operational manager V Padmavathi and Syed Mohiuddin.
Saikumar was involved in three similar financial frauds at the AP Minority Welfare Society, AP Housing Board and in another case in Chennai. Sai Kumar, adept at pulling off scams, and the three other real estate businessmen had siphoned off Rs 26 crore from UBI Bank, Karwan branch, Rs 11 crore from UBI Santosh Nagar branch and Rs 6 crore from Canara Bank, Chandanagar branch.The siphoning of money had been taking place over the past nine months and the police so far have recovered only Rs 12 - 13 lakh, said police official.
