The Krishna district police began probe into the alleged multi-crore fraud in which hundreds of customers were deceived in Canara Bank, Machilipatnam Branch, in the district.
According to the bank authorities, gold worth about Rs. 2.9 crore was robbed, and many records were tampered in the bank since a few years.
Canara Bank General Manager J. Jaya Raju alleged that Appraiser, Ghantasala Venkata Naga Rama Subramanyam had replaced gold jewellery deposited in the bank with fake ornaments.
The bank officials who conducted a departmental inquiry into the fraud found that gold jewellery, weighing about 15 kgs, was missing from the lockers. The accused also forged the signatures of some accounts.
Speaking to The Hindu , Krishna district Superintendent of Police G. Vijay Kumar said based on the complaint lodged by Mr. Raju, the Robertsonpet police registered a case on Monday, and took up investigation.
Machilipatnam Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) D. Surya Sravan Kumar said as per the bank officials, the appraiser reopened some old accounts, which were closed, by forging the signatures of the customers and duped the bank.
“We are trying to find out on how much of amount was swindled, gold missing, since how long the fraud was going on in the branch, any other bank staff were involved in the scam and other details,” said the DSP.
It was learnt that the appraiser mortgaged the gold jewellery stolen from the bank in various private finance and gold mortgaging companies and took loans.
Police, who seized some documents from Canara Bank, are probing the role of the finance companies which extended loans to the accused. The investigation officers are trying to recover the missing gold ornaments from the private firms, the SP said.
