A holiday Mumbai court hearing on Sunday, February 16, remanded Hitesh Mehta, GM (General Manager) and accounts head of the New India Cooperative Bank, in Police custody till February 21. The 57-year-old Hitesh Mehta is accused of withdrawing Rs 122 crore from the lender’s Prabhadevi and Goregaon branches.
The alleged fraud was discovered on Wednesday, February 12, when an RBI (Reserve Bank of India) team visited the New India Cooperative Bank’s Prabhadevi head office for an audit.
A police officer associated with the case told ‘Hindustan Times’ “They asked all senior officers of the bank to be present at the time of the audit and called for the keys to the bank’s safe. Senior officials, including the accounts head, Hitesh Mehta, were present during the audit. He and his team are responsible for filing TDS (Tax Deducted at Source), GST (Goods and Services Tax), and maintaining cash.”
The money in the safe was counted, and the RBI team told officials that Rs 112 crore was missing. The team started questioning each official, but no one answered satisfactorily. Later, it was found that around Rs 10 crore was missing from the Goregaon branch, too, totalling Rs 122 crore.
Devansh Ghosh, the chief accountant of New India Cooperative Bank, started gathering information about how the cash might have gone missing. In the evening of the same day, Hitesh Mehta visited RBI officials and confessed to the crime.
A case against Mehta and his associates was registered. The bank manager was booked under sections 316A (5) (criminal breach of trust by a public servant) and 61 (2) criminal conspiracy).
After Mehta’s confession, the RBI imposed restrictions on the bank, implementing strict policies and showcasing its attempts to stabilise the financial market. Currently, depositors cannot withdraw funds.
