The city economic offences wing (EOW) on Wednesday registered a case against the directors of a company, Expat Projects & Development Pvt Ltd, for allegedly cheating over 7,000 investors of Rs 700 crore.
The accused had promised to sell land plots for bungalows and agricultural land. They neither gave the plots nor returned the money to buyers.
To pre-empt the accused from fleeing the country, the process to issue look-out circulars at airports has begun.
The EOW has so far received 400 complaints, including over a 100, from Indians working abroad, said the police.
A 58-year-old who retired from an airline company lodged the complaint at V B Nagar police station, stating that she had been duped of Rs 63.7 lakh. The case was transferred to EOW. “We registered the case and searches are on at the company’s Mumbai and Bengaluru offices,” said Mumbai EOW chief Rajvardhan Sinha. A special team will probe the case under chief investigating officer Rajendra Sangle.
“The fraud took place between 2013 and 2020. Directors of the company lured investors by promising to sell plots. The buyers were told that sale registration would be done once 70% of the amount was paid. Buyers were also told that if the company fails to deliver plots or if buyers didn’t like the property, their money would be returned at 2% interest higher than the prevailing rate. However, buyers neither got the plots nor did they get their money back,” said Sangle.
Most plots were in Raigad and Pune districts. Expat has offices in Mumbai’s Kohinoor city mall at Kurla, Pune, Goa and Bengaluru. The company had initially given plots to some investors. Those who have approached the police have said they had not got anything so far, said a source.
The accused have also been booked under the Maharashtra Protection of Interest of Depositors’ Act under which the police can attach properties. “More than 30 bank accounts which had been used for financial transactions in this case have been identified. We will be asking the banks to freeze the accounts,” said an officer.