Around Rs 6 lakh was reportedly withdrawn from the bank account of the Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teerth Kshetra Trust by a gang of fraudsters on Wednesday. According to DSP Rajesh Kumar, the fraudsters used cloned cheques to withdraw money from the trust which is entrusted with Ram mandir construction.

General secretary of the Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teerth Kshetra Trust Champat Rai submitted an application to the police about the fraud yesterday.

Thereafter an FIR was lodged under Section 471 (using forged cheque as original), 468 (forgery for cheating) , 467 (forgery of valuable security), 420 (cheating) and 419 (impersonation)  of the Indian Penal Code.

Fraudsters withdrew Rs 2.5 lakh and Rs 3.5 lakh on September 1 and September 8 using a fake cheque with fake signature, Kumar said. He added that the trust authorities confirmed original cheques of the same serial numbers were used to withdraw the money. Kumar said the fraud was discovered when Rai got a verification call from the bank yesterday when the third cloned cheque of Rs 9.86 lakh was placed for clearance.

The police said the trust authorities have confirmed original cheques of the same serial numbers used to withdraw the money are with them.

According to Kumar, the fraud has shown clear negligence from bank's side as serial numbers of the cheques were compromised and that allowed fraudsters to prepare the cloned ones. In the cloned cheques, there were signatures of Rai and another member of the trust. Kumar said the amount withdrawn has been transferred to a Punjab National Bank account.

The police is still trying to trace the fraudsters and people involved in compromising the trust bank account details.Also read: GST compensation: States need 'hard cash', not govt's 'letter of comfort', says Chidambaram