Wanted fraudster held in Goa

Lucknow, Jun 14 (UNI) Special Task Force (STF) of Uttar Pradesh Police has nabbed from Goa notorious fraudester, Jagmohan Chawla, who duped thousands of investors of Lucknow, Chennai, Hyderabad, Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore through his finance companies and was at large for a decade now.

The police was in search of Chawla since 1998 as the first of five cases were registered against him in the state capital from where he had run away with nearly Rs 60 crore of hard earned money of the investors.

His modus operandi was to collect money from unsuspecting investors promsing them a high return. When the investors did not get their return, they filed complaints against Chawla, who in the meantime managed to flee with the money.

His finance companies Rockland Leasing and Rockland Thermonix had about forty branches in many parts of the country, including Lucknow. The UP police's Economic Offence Wing (EOW), which was conducting the investigation, had requested the STF to assist in the arrest.

Earlier, Jagmohan Chawla's son Arun Chawla and his accomlice Sandhya Gupta had been arrested from New Delhi and Noida in 2007 and 2006 respectively.

Manoj Kumar Jha, the Additional Superintendent of Police of STF told UNI that he was arrested yesterday from Panaji (Goa), where he was staying. He was produced in Goa court and was being taken to Lucknow on transit remand.

The EOW would further interrogate him to recover the money of investors.

UNI SB JAS AKJ RAI1633