ONE MORE ARREST MADE IN ₹1,000CRORE QNET SCAM
The Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of the Mumbai Police, investigating the Qnet scam, arrested a 32-year-old woman based on a look out circular (LOC) from the Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport on Thursday. She was detained from the airport and placed under arrest.
She has been identified as Aditi Mitra, 32, a representative of Qnet. She was trying to get on a flight to Dubai but immigration officials detained her and alerted the police.
An EOW official confirmed the development adding that she was produced before a magistrate court and remanded in custody till March 23 for further probe. The official added that she had roped in many investors.
While filing the chargesheet in December last year the EOW had recovered Rs 144 crore by freezing bank accounts of the accused. The EOW has appealed to investors to come forward and file complaints, so that their money can be returned.
An EOW official said five lakh investors were affected and the scam was worth Rs1,000 crore. A lot of money has been sent out of the country, said the official, adding that so far, they have received written complaints from only 400 victims. In all, 30 people were arrested.
A 55,000-page chargesheet against former billiards champion Michael Ferreira and 29 others was filed three years after the case was filed in 2013.The charge sheet was filed in a special court set up under the Maharashtra Protection of Interest of Depositors In Financial Establishments (MPID) Act and contains statements from 400 witnesses and several other documents that allege that hundreds of people were cheated by the company.
The EOW said Ferreira and his associates were operating an illegal money circulation scheme called Qnet and nearly five lakh investors from across the country were duped.
Qnet has been accused of using the banned binary pyramid business model for their multilevel marketing (MLM) schemes to lure investors.
A 32-year-old man was arrested for allegedly making a lewd comment to a 28-year-old immigration official at the Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport on Thursday morning.
According to Sahar police, Darshan Hatnolkar, a Kalyan resident, was on his way back home from Dubai. The incident took place at 6.50 am when Hatnolkar, under the influence of alcohol, was standing in a queue and staring at the official.
When she looked down on realising he was staring at her, he said, “Don’t be shy, look up.” He twice repeated this before another woman immigration staffer confronted him.
She alerted their wing in-charge SM More. When Hatnolkar was being taken aside for questioning, he began abusing the woman and recording the exchange on his mobile phone.
Hearing the commotion, crew members of the flight he he had arrived on said he had been misbehaving on the plane as well. They said he tried to molest a woman passenger.
He was handed over to Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) who gave custody to Sahar Police. Hatnolkar was booked under IPC sections 509, 353, 504 and 506. “He has been remanded to police custody for two days,” said a police official.
Two Chinese nationals were arrested by the Air Intelligence Unit (AIU) at the Chhatrapati Shivaji International airport on Friday with gold worth Rs37.5 lakh.
This comes three days after six Chinese nationals were held for smuggling. AIU intercepted Zhou Weiwu and his female colleague Chen Yanyan on their arrival from Hong Kong. “On searching them, we found 1,255 grams of crude gold chain with gold pendant depicting Lord Buddha and a buckle made of gold, all totalling to Rs37.65 lakh,” said an AIU officer. Investigations revealed that both of them are work for a diamond trading firm — M/s Shenzhen Obbiaa Diamond Company based in China. “Weiwu is a manager with the firm while Yanyan a translator,” said the officer.
Since recently Chinese nationals have been held for smuggling, agencies are investigating money laundering angle.authorities suspect a bigger racket with diamond merchants involved in money laundering.