A 46-year-old ex-serviceman has been arrested by the Economic Offences Wing for allegedly duping people of ₹2.5 crore in the name of investment in housing project.
Joint CP (EOW) O.P. Mishra said that the accused has been identified as K. Ponniah, owner of Defence Personnel Welfare Housing Organization and a resident of Tamil Nadu. He convinced people to invest in his housing firm, DPWHO, for a project to come up in Dwarka sector 23.
He showed investors rosy pictures of the project and said the construction had started and would be completed within the stipulated time, the police said, adding that in 2014, people were offered residential units in tower 24B built by the DPWHO. Till 2016, the accused did not give the possession and in 2017, complainants came to know that the flats booked by them were sold to other persons, the police said. A case was registered in 2017 and transferred to EOW in 2019.
Mr. Mishra said that during probe, it was revealed that the accused formed DPWHO in 2012 and then collaborated with land owner company Conchem Construction to construct two towers with 16 flats. After the completion of the said towers, one of them was supposed to be owned by the owner company and the other by accused’s firm. However, he induced investors to book flats in the tower owned by land owner.
The police said that several notices were sent to the accused to join the probe, but after he failed to do so, he was declared a proclaimed offender in 2018. On February 23, he was arrested from a lodge in Tamil Nadu.
