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by Geoff Wijesinghe

Many of us have extraordinary intellect with a genius in a particular field or sphere. In many cases, the genius in us is used for the benefit of mankind. But, there are also a fair number described as evil geniuses - parasites.

A very interesting case in point is that of an Indian, who through his evil genius, rose from peon to be a billionaire in a short time through the use of evil devices, which he picked up in double quick time. It has been described in the book titled "Bank Robberies and Forgeries" by R.S. Beniwal.

"When the Charbagh branch of State Bank of India started reconciling its accounts in February 1985, it found the difference to be of more than Rs. 30,000,000. On top of it, many drafts issued in its favour were also not traceable. Officers of the Vigilance Branch of the bank could not find anything and the whole thing was extremely perplexing. They had to entrust the matter to the Central Bureau of Investigation. After intensive investigations for 20 days, the CBI team was convinced that someone from the bank itself was involved. But, they failed to find any clue that could lead to the culprit.

The CBI detectives then started a thorough investigation into the personal lives of each and every employee of the bank. They tried to find out if any of them had accumulated wealth and assets disproportionate to his known income. The detectives finally found that the culprit was Raghunath Gaur, a peon in the bank. He had obtained assistance from his wife Bina and brother-in-law Mannalal Pandey in carrying out the fraud.

Raghunath used to take the mail from the Transport Nagar branch to the head office of the bank. During his work, he had come to fully understand the procedure of clearing cheques.

First, he opened six or seven accounts under fake names in several branches of the State Bank of India and obtained cheque book facility. He also opened two accounts in the Aminabad branch of Oudh Cooperative Bank. He had no difficulty in finding people who signed on the account opening forms as introducers.

Raghunath issued a cheque for Rs. 200,000 in favour of R.M. Gupta from the Chowk branch of the State Bank of India. He then deposited the cheque in the account of R.M. Gupta at the Aminabad branch of Oudh Cooperative Bank, which sent it for clearing at the main branch of State Bank of India. As the cheque reached there, the amount was credited to Oudh Cooperative Bank.

Then, the cheque was sent to the Chowk branch of State Bank of India for payment. Raghunath himself took the cheque and threw it away. As the cheque did not reach the bank, it could not be ascertained if the above amount was available in the account of person issuing the cheque. Next day, the clearing house issued the credit advice slip to Oudh Cooperative Bank, who credited the amount to the account of R.M. Gupta.

Raghunath immediately withdrew this amount.

Emboldened by his first success, he started indulging in the fraud with vigour. He took precaution to remove drafts of the same amount that was issued in favour of State Bank of India. So, there was no difference between credits and debits when the accounts were tallied. From October 1983, Raghunath deposited 27 such cheques in his two accounts at Oudh Cooperative Bank, defrauding 31,82,720 rupees. He also cheated Punjab National Bank, Allahabad Bank, United Commercial Bank and several other banks in Lucknow in the same manner.

It was only when the accounts of the clearing house were tallied in 1985, that this huge fraud came to light.

The CBI detectives found that he possessed a deluxe bus, Piaggo scooter, gold ornaments weighing half a kilogram, television, refrigerator, two bungalows and a farm. A sum of 20 lakhs of rupees was recovered from him. His fake accounts in the banks were immediately sealed, and Raghunath was arrested on the 11th of December and sent to prison. Finally, he found himself in the same position, from which he started on his journey of fraud and deception. How true it is that crime never pays.

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