Unemployed computer graduates held for forging cheques

The accused,Junaid Ahmed (27) and Prabhat Kumar (25),had worked with an insurance firm and with a bank. However,they were sacked from the bank in February 2008 owing to poor performance.

“Both Ahmed and Kumar hail from Azamgarh in Uttar Pradesh and had come to the city a couple of years back in search of jobs. After they lost their jobs in February,they had tried to find some source of employment but were not successful. In October,they took a personal loan of Rs 45,000 from the Fullerton India Credit Company Ltd. The duo scanned the cheque and deposited two fraudulent cheques adding up to Rs 1.93 lakh in the ICICI Bank,” said police sub-inspector Ajay Sindkar of the Pant Nagar police station who is investigating the case.

Their fraud came to light when their accounts showed an unapproved debit of funds and soon after a representative from the company,Gautam Kotak,filed a complaint with the Pant Nagar police station.

The police got their first breakthrough when they learnt that the money had been directly transferred to two accounts in a private bank.

“Based on the documents that the bank provided us,we traced the accounts of the accused. After we got their names,the company’s records revealed that Ahmed had recently taken a loan from the company. During their stint with this bank,they had been given their salary accounts and the Fullerton Company’s money had been transferred to the same accounts. Based on the addresses given in their bank documents,we traced them,” said Sindkar who arrested the accused last week.

Investigations revealed that the duo had scanned the cheque issued by the company essentially to use the logo of the bank while forging the cheques. “Both the accused are well-versed with photoshop and after scanning the cheque,they also forged the branch manager’s signature on both the copies. The cited amount on the original cheque had been handwritten and not printed,which made the forgery easier,” Sindkar.