Colaba Police registers FIR against 3 people in gold loan fraud

Mumbai: Colaba Police have filed an FIR against three individuals for obtaining a loan by pledging fake gold. The police mentioned that the goldsmith appointed by the bank has also been implicated in this case because the goldsmith had declared the fake gold as genuine. This led the bank to grant a loan of Rs 18.70 lakh on the fake gold. According to the information provided by the police, the complainant, Sanjay Warkhade (37), who works as a senior manager at GS Mahanagar Co-operative Bank Limited, informed the police that a person named Anil Mote wished to secure a loan by using gold as collateral at the bank. T

o facilitate the loan process, the bank had engaged a goldsmith named Bhairawlal Jain, whose responsibility was to assess the authenticity of the gold and determine its fair value. Mote submitted gold jewelry to the bank as collateral for the loan. After examining the gold, Jain valued it at Rs 18.70 lakh. Following Jain’s assessment, the bank approved Mote’s loan based on the quoted value. A police officer stated that initially, Mote made timely loan installment payments. However, he later ceased these payments. When the loan installments stopped, the bank issued a notice to Mote, informing him that if he did not make the installment payments, the gold he had provided as collateral would be sold.

In response, Mote provided written consent to the bank, authorising the sale of his gold due to his inability to make the payments. When the bank attempted to sell the gold, it was discovered to be fake. Consequently, the bank has filed a cheating case against Mote and Jain. During police questioning, Mote revealed that an individual named Devidas Kawad had supplied him with the gold, and he had transferred the funds received from pawning the gold to Kawad’s account. A police officer confirmed that an FIR has been registered in this case, and an investigation is now underway.