The Criminal Investigation Department taken into custody a gang of five, led by a woman, who exploited international credit cards and defraud,over Rs 15 crore under the pretext of running a charitable trust.
As CID investigations reveal that Regina Seelan along with 6 other trustees established 'Salve Regina Charitable Trust" in the city in March 2005 and obtained exemption under section 80G of the Income Tax Act in 2007, and in 2009 obtained permission from the Ministry of Home Affairs to accept contributions under the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act.
It also launched a website - www.src-trust.org and in June 2009, approached the Merchants Services Wing of the Standard Chartered Bank, Chennai and applied for a e-commerce gateway facility to receive foreign funds.
City-based charitable trust duped 134 bank customers of over Rs 15 cr by making 995 illegal online transactions using their credit cards
A city-based bank has filed a complaint against a city-based charitable trust for fraudulently making online transactions worth Rs 15.6 crore within four months.
The fraud came to light when bank officials started receiving complaints from around 134 customers, alleging that fraudulent online transactions were made using their cards.
After verification, the bank officials told them that the transactions were a donation to a charitable trust, to which, the customers replied that they have not made any donations to any trust and the transactions were a fraud.
Based on the information, Maria Ruben, legal officer, ICICI bank, has filed a complaint with the cyber crime police.
Ruben said that Salve Regina Charitable Trust, which has a registered office at Kalyan Nagar, had approached the bank's Indiranagar branch with a request of setting up an electronic payment gateway banking facility to seek payments and donations from philanthropists for various charitable works.
Since it was for a social cause, the bank readily agreed and set up the facility on its official website, allowing them to accept payments through the Internet.
Those arrested include: Victor D'Souza, treasurer; Christy Solomon, trustee; Thomas P Josephs secretary; Selva Babu website designer. Trust president Regina was also arrested on October 26, 2011.
The NGO stole credit card data online to make fraudulent transactions and investigations reveal that the same was used to transfer cash to the trust account through the e-commerce gateway.
The account holders replied to the bank stating that the transactions had taken place without their consent and they refused to pay any service charges.
Shankar Bidar Director General of CID, i said that the Salve Regina Charitable Trust has collected Rs 15.68 crore through 995 fraudulent credit card transactions between July 1 and August 13, 2010. Also, the fraud victims were mostly from the US and other foreign countries.
Investigation has revealed that Regina has purchased eleven properties in Bangalore East Taluk in the name of the trust, which are collectively worth Rs 9 crore.
When the trust obtained permission to accept foreign contributions under the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act, they had opened an account in the State Bank of India to receive the foreign contributions.
According to the provisions of the FCRA, the trust was required to credit all the foreign contributions to the designated SBI account, which was not done. Therefore, the trust has violated the provisions of the FCRA act and is also being prosecuted for this violation.
Examination of the seized material has also shown that the accused prepared fake bank deposit receipts to lure members of the public to make deposits with them.
The CID has seized documents detailed to the fraudulently purchased properties, besides 3 four-wheelers.Incriminating documents have also been seized from the residences and offices of the accused, apart from hard disks and laptops.
Salve Regina charitable Trust ®
#09 via Hanumantha Nagara
Doddagubi (post) Bileshivale
Bangalore – 49
Mrs.Reginasheelan – 9632729956 (president/chief functionary)
Mr. Johnson - 9886851535 (Manager)
Mr. Victor D’souza - +91 9677073761 (Treasurer)
