Mumbai: ‘Devotees’ defrauded Borivali couple of Rs 70.5 lakh
Mumbai: A couple from Borivali allegedly lost ₹70.5 lakh to three people from Kolhapur after they met through a temple priest. In their police complaint, 38-year-old housewife Meenal Seth and her husband Deepakkumar said they visited a temple in Karnataka in 2021. There he went to the Jain sage Namit Sagar and later started going to him for sage advice.
In 2022, the priest introduced the couple to his “devotees” Deshbhushan Deshmane, Pritam Deshmane and Rajendra Nailerlikar. He said all three were experienced investors with expertise in foreign exchange trading.
Subsequently, the couple met several times and shared information about stock and forex trading. He allegedly induced them to invest by promising good returns. Falling into the trap, the complainants transferred a total of ₹72.5 lakh to the trio in various transactions from April 2022 to August 2022. However, he did not get any benefit.
After much back-and-forth, the trio returned around ₹2 lakh, the couple alleged, mentioning that Nerlikar had given a check of ₹18 lakh in May 2023. This turned out to be fake, after which the accused kept giving empty assurances, he said. Finally, the complainants visited the house of the trio and found that they had similarly defrauded others of more than ₹5 crore.
On January 31, the couple filed a case against them under sections 34 (common intention), 406 (breach of trust), 409 (criminal breach of trust by agent) and 420 (cheating and dishonesty) of the Indian Penal Code at Kasturba Marg. . police station.
