ED restores Rs 11 crore in Gurugram Citibank fraud case

New Delhi, May 22 (PTI) The Enforcement Directorate said on Thursday that it has restored funds worth about Rs 11 crore to Citibank in connection with a 2010 fraud case perpetrated by one of its employees working at the bank's Gurugram branch in Haryana.

The case pertains to the late Shivraj Puri who convinced bank customers to invest in a fraudulent "high return" investment scheme through which he is alleged to have cheated funds worth over Rs 302 crore.

Puri, who died at the age of 46 in a Haryana jail in 2022, and some others were convicted by a local court in this case in February 2014.

The bank had settled claims amounting to Rs 302.37 crore to the investors of the scheme perpetrated by Shivraj Puri, the federal probe agency said in a statement.

"The bank compensated/paid the said amount to the investors after the investors subrogated their rights against Shivraj Puri to the bank," it said.

Meanwhile, the ED had attached assets, including bank deposits, worth Rs 30 crore under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) as part of this investigation.

The bank (which became the legitimate claimant) filed an application before the special PMLA court for "restoration" of the balance amount lying in the bank account (in which the attached proceeds of crime were lying), and the ED consented to the restoration of these funds to the lender, it said.

The court, on May 8, ordered the restoration of the properties worth Rs 11 crore and the interest accrued thereupon to Citibank, it said.

Puri, as per the ED, had opened an account with Citibank "fraudulently" and convinced Citi Gold customers, whose accounts were managed by him, to invest in the "exclusive" high return and capital-guaranteed financial products, which he had claimed were authorised by the bank and managed by brokerage houses.

In reality, the bank did not offer such products.

The payments from the investors were received in the said account opened fraudulently by Puri, and in lieu of the said payments, he deceptively prepared hand-written deposit receipts and issued them to the investors on the printed stationery of the bank, it said. PTI NES AMJ AMJ AMJ