Two accused of duping beverage firm denied bail

Vadodara: A local court in Savli has rejected the anticipatory bail application of six persons accused of duping Manpasand Beverages Ltd (MBL).
The accused, who are associated with a private financial firm, were booked by the Bhadarva police last year for duping MBL of hundreds of crores by promising the company owners loans worth Rs 100 crore.
Police said the accused identified as Bharat Patel, Hardik Patel and Ajay Agrawal, all residents of Mumbai and Vishal Jariwala, a resident of Ahmedabad, Parashiva Bassapamurthy, a resident of Bangalore and Pavan Rathi of Vadodara, had approached MBL management and offered to give a loan of Rs 100 crores. MBL was in trouble last year when the goods and services tax (GST) officials raided the company’s premises over tax evasion.
MBL’s several directors had resigned from the company and even the banks refused to give them loans. The accused promised to give MBL a loan in lieu mortgaged the company’s properties worth Rs 600 to Rs 700 crores. MBL management said that it got loans of just Rs 12 crores.
It was also alleged that the accused kept their directors in MBL and relieved the employees from accounts and other departments.
While the accused promised to cooperate in investigations, the court observed that they didn’t turn up when the police sent them summons thrice last year. The court also considered the big amount of money involved in the cheating case and rejected the anticipatory bail application of the accused on Wednesday.
The GST officials had raided MBL premises last year and unveiled a racket of creating fake/dummy units for availing fraudulent credit and committing tax evasion of Rs 40 crores and involving turnover of Rs 300 crore. GST officials had said the investigation unearthed a network of more than 30 fake units located in various parts of the country which were used for committing fraud by availing illegal credit. MBL had registered a net loss Rs 206 crore for 2018-19.