New Delhi: A Delhi court on Wednesday asked two
directors and four promoters of a firm to respond to a plea of
the police to frame 172 separate charges due to as many
chargesheets against them in connection with cheating of over
70,000 people of more than Rs 100 crore.
Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate R K Tripathi
asked directors Chetan Mallik and Rajesh Mallik and four
promoters of B K Jewellery and Marketing Pvt Ltd to file their
reply by August four.
"It is pertinent to mention that in view of the provisions
of the law, for every distinct offence of which chargesheeted
persons are accused, there shall be a separate charge and
every charge shall be tried separately," Public Prosecutor
Naveen Kumar had told the court.
The court put the application of the police for hearing
arguments for August 11.
In their plea, the police claimed 516 cases were
registered on the basis of separate complaints against the
accused and three offences have been clubbed together by the
investigating agency. Therefore, a total of 172 separate
chargesheets were filed in the court.
The court had on July 14 charged the accused with the
offences of cheating, criminal breach of trust and criminal
conspiracy, besides under the various provisions of the Prize
Chit Fund and Money Circulation Scheme Act.
The framing of charges paves the way for the start of
trial against the accused.
According to the police, the six accused had allegedly
cheated 70,890 people of over Rs 100 crore.
A total of 516 people had lodged their complaints with the
Economic Offence Wing (EOW) of the Delhi Police since 2009 as
they failed to pay them back despite their promise.
The accused had also allegedly indulged in cheating,
forgery and criminal breach of trust by causing losses to the
exchequer to the tune of Rs one crore by not depositing
value-added tax (VAT) and Rs 10 crore as TDS.
PTI
First Published: Wednesday, July 28, 2010, 19:09