All that glitters is not gold, manager finds out

NT Correspondent

Bengaluru:

Vijayanagar police arrested three persons for allegedly cheating various private finance firms by pledging around 15 kgs of fake gold ornaments in different states. The accused were identified by the police as Arun Raju, 30, Satyananda, 28, and Dattatreya, 28. The trio was arrested by the city police when they had visited a private finance firm near Vijayanagar along with 235.6 grams of fake gold jewellery seeking a loan of Rs 7.15 lakh.

Despite the hallmark logo, the purity of the metal could not be ascertained, due to which the manager suspected foul play and informed the jurisdictional police regarding the matter. Interrogating the accused, the police found that the trio had cheated several other firms in the city and districts, including Udupi, Gadag, Koppal and Hubli. It was also revealed that they had cheated a Surat-based firm in Gujarat with their modus operandi.

The police said that the trio had pledged around 15 kg of fake gold ornaments and had obtained lakhs of money as loan. The police have sought information from all the firms claimed to have cheated by the accused and are trying to estimate the amount of money they had obtained from them. Further investigation is underway