Court Orders Trial For Real Estate Tycoon Gopal Ansal In Cheating Case

A Delhi court has ordered that real estate tycoon Gopal Ansal should stand trial for allegedly cheating and defrauding a private company and its promoters in the name of investment in a building at Connaught Place here in 1991.

Metropolitan Magistrate Yashdeep Chahal ordered framing of charges against Mr Ansal for the alleged offence, including cheating, forgery and criminal conspiracy.

The court, however, discharged Sushil Ansal, who was a director of the accused company, Ansal Properties which was developing the Statesman House here, saying the materials on record were "grossly insufficient." "Apart from a bare statement that the fraud was not possible without the involvement of all the directors, there is nothing on record to implicate him," the judge noted in an order passed on April 4.

The court adjourned the matter for June 1 for formally framing of the charges against the accused.

According to the complaint, the complainant, Sachdeva & Sons Industries Pvt. Ltd. had in 1991 invested in Statesman House, which was being developed by Ansal Properties at Connaught Place, New Delhi through one Krishan Bakshi, now dead, who was working at the complainant company and was known to co-accused Gopal Ansal.

However, later the complainants learned that the receipts were issued only in the name of Mr Bakshi and that too towards the payment of a single flat in the project.

The accused persons conspired to deceive the complainant in order to extract money from them and diverted that amount for booking a flat solely in the name of Mr Bakshi, the complaint alleged. During investigation it appeared that Mr Bakshi had booked a flat at Statesman House in January 1992 with Ansal Properties, the court noted.

The investigation also reveals that the entire amount received from the complainant for booking a property in Statesman House was found to be diverted in favour of the individual booking of Mr Bakshi for a flat, it noted.

During the probe, it was also found that the accused had forged documents in the process to cheat, it noted.

The court noted that accused Mr Bakshi and Gopal Ansal were known to each other.

It further noted that Mr Bakshi was offered a special treatment by Ansal Properties, specifically in view of the booking application form for the subject property, whereby booking was made without mentioning any payment plan or time of payment, which was mandatory for other buyers.

The accused company relied upon forged and fabricated affidavit and indemnity bond purportedly signed by the complainants and without seeking any response from them, it noted. "Moreover, the complainants were in fact never even informed that the amounts received from them were diverted for the booking of a different property in the name of a different person and they were never called in person, thereby raising grave suspicion," the judge noted.

The court further noted that the accused company perpetuated this default and went on to permit the transfer of the subject property in the names of the subsequent purchasers despite knowing that the very ownership of the subject property was obtained on the basis of forged and fabricated documents. 

It further noted that even after receiving the complaint of diversion of the complainant's money from a joint property to an individual property, the accused firm made no efforts to inquire into the status of the joint property and could not provide any document regarding the cancellation of the booking made with respect to the joint property. 

"The evidence indicate that the accused Gopal Ansal was not only known to the accused Krishan Bakshi but was also a part of the chain constituting the allegations in this case," the judge said. The judge further said, "In view of the foregoing discussion, I find it a fit case to frame charges against accused Gopal Ansal."

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