Police nab prime accused in Citibank fraud

Two days after it was told about a huge financial fraud in Delhi’s suburban town, the Gurgaon police arrested the prime accused, Shivraj Puri, though without saying how.

“The size of the fraud could be about Rs 300 crore. It is too early to give a complete figure,” said S S Deswal, city police commissioner. He said Puri was presented before a local court that sent him to a week in police custody.

Puri, a relationship manager with Citibank, is charged with duping high net worth individuals (HNIs) into investing in fraudulent schemes and diverting the money into accounts belonging to his wife and other relatives.

Deswal said of the Rs 300 crore transacted by Puri, Premnath, Sheila Premnath and Diksha Puri from their bank accounts opened in the Citibank account, around Rs 200 crore was collected after duping companies and the remaining Rs 100 crore was collected from individuals.

Senior officials said they’d managed to identify 18 such HNI clients whose money was diverted by Puri. Police said Puri had showed a forged notification of the Securities and Exchange Board of India for assuring the clients that they should invest in the scheme.

The formal complaint was filed by Binu Soman, assistant vice president of Citibank, on Tuesday.

Deswal said Puri had diverted most of the funds through his father, Raghuraj Puri’s brokerage firm, Norway Martin, so that the funds could be invested in the stock market.

He said the city police was competent enough to complete the investigations on its own.