A police probe into the scam pertaining to misappropriation of Rs 4.65 crore, raised through a public issue in 1992 for Vadodara-based Topline Shoes, has revealed that former cricketer Sunil Gavaskar has not yet resigned from the company. Topline Shoes is one of the 22 vanishing companies in the country.‘‘Even if Gavaskar resigned, his resignation letter never reached the Registrar of Companies (RoC) in Ahmedabad,’’ said Police Commissioner Sudhir Sinha. ‘‘Hence, he still continues to be a director of the company.’’When police contacted Gavaskar after the RoC registered the case, the former cricketer said he had resigned from the company long ago. But RoC officials, during questioning by police recently, said they never received the resignation letter. Asked if Gavaskar would also be summoned to appear before the police for recording his statements, Sinha said: ‘‘Not immediately’’.When questioned about the defence put up by the company’s managing director H.M.G. Murthy that Topline Shoes was wrongly mentioned as a vanishing company, Sinha said Murthy neither informed the RoC nor SEBI when he closed down the registered office of the company and, hence, it was considered a vanishing company.‘‘Moreover, Murthy committed an offence by not submitting balance sheets and audited accounts of the company after 1994,’’ said Sinha.Investigations also revealed that Topline Shoes had been delisted from SEBI for failing to pay annual subscription charges.In another development, police today issued summons to Murthy, asking him to appear before the police as an ‘‘accused’’ within 24 hours. Sinha said the summons were issued under Section 160 of the CrPC as Murthy was not making himself available to the police for questioning and had been contacting police through his family members.A police official said Murthy was not available at his residence and the summons could not be served. ‘‘If Murthy avoids the summons, we will launch a search,’’ said the official.
