Dubbing it as ‘one of the biggest scams in India’, the Mumbai Police, on Monday, registered an FIR against National Spot Exchange Ltd. (NSEL) promoter Jignesh Shah and others in connection with the Rs.5,600-crore payment crisis at the crippled exchange, and began raiding their offices, residences and warehouses across the country.
NSEL, promoted by Shah-led Financial Technologies (FT), has been facing problems in settling Rs.5,600 crore dues of 148 members/brokers, representing 13,000 investor-clients, after it suspended trade on July 31 on the direction of the government.
Other promoters, directors and defaulting brokers of the spot exchange have also been named in the FIR, which comes nearly two months after NSEL suspended trading.
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The accused have been charged with several criminal offences.
“An FIR was registered by the Economic Offences Wing (EOW) this morning against the NSEL promoters, directors and defaulters on charges of cheating, forgery and breach of trust among others,” Joint Police Commissioner Himanshu Roy said.
The NSEL office, residences of Mr. Shah, Chairman and Managing Director of Financial Technologies, and Joseph Massey, Managing Director and CEO of MCX Stock Exchange (also promoted by FT), in Mumbai were raided on Monday.
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The FIR included officials, namely, Anjani Sinha, Shantilal Guru, B. D. Pawar, Amit Mukherjee, M. C. Pandey, Shrikant Jawalgekar, Neerav Panday, company’s auditor Mukesh Shah and others.