IMA scam: CBI seeks sanction to prosecute five Karnataka police officers including 2 IPS

Team Udayavani, Dec 19, 2019, 7:20 PM IST

Bengaluru: The CBI has sought sanction to prosecute six Karnataka officials, including two senior IPS officers posted in the state, as the agency plans to file a supplementary charge sheet detailing their alleged role in aiding the Rs 4,000-crore I-Monetary Advisory (IMA) ponzi scam, officials said Thursday.

It is alleged that IMA and its sister ponzi companies had lured gullible investors offering higher returns on their investment using Islamic ways, they said.

The CBI has written to the Karnataka government seeking nod for prosecuting IPS officers Hemant Nimbalkar of 1998 batch and Ajay Hilori of 2008 batch. The residences of the two officers were searched by the CBI earlier this year, they said.

While Nimbalkar was posted as the then Inspector General of Economic Offences, Hilori was the then Deputy Commissioner of East Bengaluru, the sources said.

Besides, the CBI has also sought similar sanction for the then Deputy Superintendent of Police CID EB Sridhara, Inspector and SHO Commercial Street Police Station M Ramesh and sub-inpector of the station P Gowrishankar and the then Assistant Commissioner Bengaluru North Sub Division LC Nagaraj.

Sridhara was the inquiry officer and Hemant Nimbalkar was the supervisory officer in the enquiry done by CID EOW into activities of IMA group entities, the sources said.

The agency has found in its probe so far that more than Rs 4000 crore of deposits were illegally raised from lakhs of innocent investors, but the CID of the state gave a clean chit to the company and its promoter-director Mohammed Mansoor Khan.

As a result, activities of IMA group continued unhindered which facilitated collection of hundreds of crore from thousands of innocent persons, the agency alleged.

Nagaraj also enquired into the affairs of IMA and gave a clean chit without conducting proper probe.

The clean chit was given on the grounds that no unauthorised deposits were collected and investments of partners, limited liability, partnership are exempted under KPID Act, the agency has found, they said.

The agency probe shows that Hilori, directly supervising the work of Ramesh and Gowrishankar, had failed to register cases in spite of receiving written complaints from the state government officials and social activists, the sources said.

It is alleged that the trio did not conduct any inspection of records or documents of IMA but instead closed all these complaints in order to favour the group, they said.

All these public servants have dishonestly favoured IMA group and allowed them to continue with their activities, the CBI probe shows.

CBI probe has shown that IMA group entities headed by Mansoor Khan had raised illegal and unauthorised deposits in an alleged in dishonest and fraudulent manner from innocent investors to the tune of over Rs 4,000 crore, the sources said.

As on date over Rs 3,000 crore are outstanding in the form of principal amount and interest in respect of 76,000 investors, they said.

Further investigation is continuing to unearth larger conspiracy, money trail, end beneficiaries and diversion of funds, they said.

The agency said the RBI has repeatedly wrote to these authorities through state chief secretary and DGP requesting urgent and suitable action.

The CBI has already filed two charge sheets against 22 accused, including directors, chartered accountants, middlemen and the company and its sister concerns.

The agency said the Reserve Bank of India repeatedly flagged the issue about unauthorised collections and raising of deposits by the IMA group at the state level coordination committee meetings and had also written several letters to various authorities in Karnataka.

Based on these letters from the RBI, enquiries were conducted by these officers and they allegedly failed in their duties in pointing out glaring irregularities committed by the IMA group and gave clean chits, the officials said.

A probe into the expenditure statements of IMA group has shown huge payments to these officials alleged to have been paid as bribe on multiple occasions by the company directors, the officials said.

The CBI alleged that the probe so far indicated deliberate inaction and favours to the IMA group on the part of these public servants and authorities for several months, they said.

The multi-crore ponzi scheme run by Karnataka-based IMA and its group entities allegedly duped lakhs of people promising higher returns using Islamic ways of investment.

The CBI had booked Mohammed Mansoor Khan, managing director of the company, and others pursuant to the notifications issued by the Karnataka government and the government of India, the officials said.

The case came to light when Khan fled to Dubai, leaving behind a video message, saying that he was committing suicide because of “corruption in the state and central governments”.

Khan was arrested on July 21 on his arrival in New Delhi by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) and is currently in judicial custody.

He had allegedly promised returns ranging from 2.5 to 3 per cent per month to the investors, who are mainly from the Muslim community.

The Karnataka government has constituted a special investigation team (SIT) of the police to probe the case before handing it over to the CBI.