Himalaya Harbinger, Rudrapur Bureau
Dehradun: The Nanital district and sessions court has sentenced the director of Society Aadhaar Multiple Producer Company Limited, and his wife, the company’s chairman and managing director, to four years of rigorous imprisonment and fined them Rs 30,000 each for defrauding depositors of multiple crores.
The district govt counsel S K Sharma said Abhay Srivastava and Deepa Srivastava operated a branch of the company in Haldwani from 2016 to 2019, promoting it as a firm that provide training in dairy, fishery, and poultry farming and offered low-interest loans for employment. They also promised depositors a 12% return on maturity and falsely claimed the company was authorised for banking operations. Many people in Haldwani opened accounts and invested in various schemes of the company, but it stopped payments in 2018, after which the couple fled.
On Sept 1, 2019, Manoj Pandey, a Haldwani resident, filed a complaint against the couple and an FIR was subsequently registered under relevant sections of the IPC and the Uttaranchal Depositors’ Interest Protection (UPID) Act. The couple were arrested from a house in Bakshi Ka Talab, Lucknow, on Oct 17, 2020.
During the investigation, charges were framed under sections 420 (cheating and dishonestly inducing delivery of property) and 409 (criminal breach of trust) of the IPC and section 3 (fraudulent default by financial establishment) of the UPID Act
.The prosecution presented 17 witnesses, establishing that the accused misled the public, falsely claimed banking authorisation, and absconded with millions.
Based on witness testimonies and evidence, the court on Friday sentenced them to four years of rigorous imprisonment and a fine of Rs 10,000 each under section 420, four years and a fine of Rs 10,000 each under section 409, and four years and a fine of Rs 10,000 each under section 3 of the UPID Act.
