ACB raids on three officers
Illegal assets worth crores unearthed
Bengaluru, July 18: ACB sleuths conducted raids on the houses and offices of three government officers in the state on Tuesday and unearthed illegal assets disproportionate to their known sources of income worth crores and recovered the documents.
The ACB sleuths raided the office of Handlooms and Textiles department joint director B Vijay Kumar Nirali at Railway Parallel Road and on his house and found that the officer has two houses, four sites including two sites measuring 5 gunta each in Mangaluru and Bengaluru, 276 gram gold, 3700 gram silver, two cars, two bikes, Rs 10.59 cash and household articles worth Rs 20 lakh.
When the ACB raided on the house of Handlooms and Textiles department deputy director Gangaiah, the anti-corruption agency found one house, four sites, 4.36 acre agriculture land, 0.5 acre industrial land, 220 gm gold, 670 gm silver, one car, one bike, Rs 64,000 cash, and household articles worth Rs 15 lakh.
In the same way, the ACB officers also found one house, 6 acres of agriculture land in Koppal taluk, 585 gm gold, 2.5 kg silver, two cars, Rs 2.53 lakh cash and household articles worth Rs 3 lakh were found in the house of Chikmagaluru ACF KN Rangaswamy.
The ACB sleuths conducted raids on the houses and offices of the three officers in eight places simultaneously on July 17. Investigation and verification of documents is going on, sources said.
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Three company directors held in Rs 100-crore investment fraud in Kochi
Kochi (Kerala) (PTI): Police on Sunday arrested three directors of a firm accused of cheating hundreds of investors of over Rs 100 crore through a fake investment scheme linked to agricultural tourism here, officials said.
The accused were identified as Muraleedharan, Ashik Murali and Akhil Murali, all natives of Thrissur.
The arrests were made by the Kalamassery police in connection with a fraud involving ATCOS (Agri Tourism Cooperative Society), a firm headquartered at Pathadipalam here.
Police said the company had promised high returns by collecting investments from the public in the agricultural tourism sector, but allegedly cheated hundreds of people and fled with the money.
ATCOS was registered under the Multi-State Cooperative Societies Act and operated 13 branches across various districts in Kerala, besides a branch in Coimbatore in Tamil Nadu, officials said.
When investors failed to receive their promised returns or the invested amount, complaints were filed with the police.
Officials said around 54 cases have been registered against the firm in 32 police stations across the state, including 29 cases at the Kalamassery police station alone.
Following instructions from Kochi City Police Commissioner K S Mahesh Kumar, a special investigation team was formed under the supervision of Deputy Commissioner of Police (Law and Order) Shehensha and Thrikkakara ACP Manoj Kumar.
The team traced the accused to an apartment in Amala Nagar in Thrissur, where they had been hiding after secretly renting the flat, officials said.
The bank accounts of the accused have been frozen, and steps have been initiated to trace their assets, officials said.
Police also conducted a raid at the company’s office at Pathadipalam and seized several documents related to the case.
The accused were produced before the Judicial First Class Magistrate Court in Kalamassery, which remanded them to judicial custody and sent them to Kakkanad jail.
Police said they would seek the custody of the accused for further interrogation as the investigation continues.
