Gang duping farmers busted

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, December 24

The Jalandhar rural police today busted a gang that had been duping farmers of Doaba by selling their tractors on forged and fake documents.

The accused used to take tractors from farmers on rent and later sold the same at throwaway prices to third parties.

Fourteen tractors, worth Rs 60 lakh, were recovered by the rural police from two swindlers, Swaranjit Singh of New Model Town Colony Malsian near Shahko,t and his aide Gurcharan Singh of Chakpeer near Nakodar.

Superintendent of Police (Detective) said the two accused on the pretext of engaging tractors with a construction firm were hiring tractors from farmers on rent and they even used to prepare fake agreement for the deal.

After taking the tractors on rent, the accused had been selling the same at throwaway prices. “Before executing the sale deed, the swindlers used to prepare fake ownership documents to further befool the buyers that they were the real owners of the tractors. The police had also recovered fake and forged documents of tractors from the accused.

Fourteen recovered tractors included seven Mahindra, two Farmtrack, two Sonalika, one New Holland and two of the Eicher brand. The real tractors owners had been informed about the recoveries, said the police.

Interestingly, before committing the fraud with any farmer or to make the farmer believe that their deal was genuine and fair they, for the initial few months, also used to pay rent of tractors amounting from Rs 20,000 to Rs 25,000 per month to farmers. Once the farmer developed trust, they went ahead committing the fraud.

Kingpin Swaranjit also wanted in bank fraud case

The kingpin of the gang, Swaranjit Singh, is also wanted in a bank fraud case where he had prepared fake loan cases with the connivance of bank manager. He had defrauded Union Bank, Kapurthala branch, and the case was registered at the Kapurthala city police station under Sections 419, 465, 467, 468, 471, 472 and 120-B of the IPC on December 14, 2013. He, along with his seven accomplices, including the then Union Bank manager Monica Mahajan, had defrauded the bank of several lakhs by getting a loan sanctioned on fake and forged documents. Swaranjit was also declared proclaimed offender in the case.