Gokhale institute fund fraud: Kin of three SIS trustees illegally appointed as members

Following an FIR lodged by Dr Vishal Gaikwad, the officiating Deputy Registrar of GIPE, the police had arrested SIS secretary Milind Bhagwant Deshmukh (52) on April 5, for alleged fraud, misappropriation and cheating of Rs 1.42 crore, between December 2022 and 2023. Police booked Deshmukh and others in the case under Indian Penal Code sections 406, 409 and 420.

Citing developments in the probe, a team from Deccan police station produced Deshmukh before the court on Wednesday and sought an extension of his custody for five more days.

Police said they also want to investigate the then vice chancellor, registrar and account officer of GIPE to probe their role into the alleged illegal transfer of institute’s money to the SIS.

Police submitted that as per a supplementary statement of Gaikwad, recorded on April 8, an amount of Rs 10 lakh was allegedly transferred from GIPE’s account to SIS on March 1, 2024. But it was allegedly used for paying advocate’s fees in a personal case (of cheating and forgery lodged last year) against Deshmukh, related to land owned by the Mahadev Govind Ranade Charitable Trust at Shewalewadi in Haveli taluka of Pune district.

Meanwhile, as per the FIR lodged by Gaikwad, the income for GIPE, which was established by the SIS in 1930, is derived from grants received from the Central and Maharashtra governments and UGC, and tuition fee collected from students. And, as per the UGC norms, funds from the accounts of GIPE cannot be transferred to any other bank accounts or sponsored organisations, the FIR stated.

According to the FIR, without following the legal procedures, Deshmukh wrote a letter bearing his signature on December 12, 2022, demanding Rs 1.5 crore from GIPE, to change “lease hold” status of the society’s land in Nagpur to “free hold”.

The FIR mentions that the letter got in-principle approval from the GIPE board on December 14, 2022, which informed two days later that an amount of Rs 1.5 crore is being given for the purpose. The FIR alleged that Rs 1.02 crore of GIPE was then transferred to the account of the District Collector in Nagpur and Rs 40 lakh to SIS by cheque, for related expenses — all in violation of UGC norms.

Police said they want to probe the accused over the Rs 40 lakh allegedly transferred to some persons as “service charges”. Police said Gaikwad has, in his supplementary statement, made a complaint regarding alleged misappropriation of more funds by Deshmukh by transferring money for “lift maintenance” and other purposes at GIPE to the SIS.

Police also informed the court about the eight trustees of SIS — they have recorded statements five, who include Gangadhar Narayan Sahu (66) and Ramakant Vrundavan Leka (68) of Odisha, Dinesh Ramchandra Mishra (69), Amareshchandra Tripathi (76) and Atmanand Mishra (76) of Uttar Pradesh.

Police said as per these statements, no resolution of SIS was passed for seeking financial assistance from GIPE for the Nagpur land. Police stated that a proposal regarding the Nagpur land was first placed in a meeting of SIS trustees on January 23, 2023. But the five trustees were not present at this meeting. So the meeting was not held “by law” of the society as per the majority. Moreover, a day before this meeting, in the presence of the other three trustees their relatives were illegally appointed as “under training member” of SIS and then the proposal related to Nagpur land was sanctioned, police told the court.

Police said that further custody of the accused was required to probe the three trustees together. Court extended the custody of Deshmukh till April 11.

Police are probing into funds that were transferred multiple times from the bank accounts of GIPE to SIS. Meanwhile, police have procured GIPE’s audit reports for three financial years from 2021 to 2024 and other documents, minutes of meetings pertaining to the offence. Police have also gathered details of all bank accounts of SIS and GIPE for investigation.