Former bank manager among two nabbed for gold fraud

BENGALURU: The Sathanur police of Ramanagara district arrested two persons, including a former bank manager, for allegedly replacing 9.5kg of pledged gold with fake gold jewellery, and selling the original. Police recovered gold worth Rs 2.12 crore from the accused.The accused were identified as Anant Nag K, a resident of Peenya and former bank manager, and Rajneesh S Jain (42), of Gandhi Nagar in Mandya, who received the gold from him.

Police said the assistant general manager of the bank lodged a complaint on July 16, alleging that the valuer appointed by the bank, Rajanna, had certified 9.5kg of gold pledged with the Honniganahalli branch as genuine, though it was fake. Based on the complaint, Rajanna was picked up for questioning and he pleaded innocence. A further probe revealed that former bank manager Anant Nag was involved in the fraud.

“Nag identified pledged gold for which customers had failed to repay loans for years, and replaced such gold with fake ones in the past three years. He had stolen 9.5kg of gold belonging of 352 customers, and sold it to Jain,” the police said.