Tamil Nadu: Teen accused of SBI Bank forgery had personal issues, no sinister motive, say cops

Chennai: The Tamil Nadu Police on Monday said that a teenager, who had allegedly run a fake bank branch from his home in Panruti, Cuddalore district, was dealing with a lot of personal issues and did not perform the forgery with a sinister motive. The police officers investigating the case also said that so far they haven’t received any complaint from people having been cheated of their money or valuables in this case.

The investigating officer of the case added that the 19-year old accused in this case had a troubled past. His parents were SBI bank employees and he had been exposed to banking functions from a very young age as his parents used to take him along to the branch.

The boy’s father who was the then bank manager passed away in 2007 when the boy was barely six years of age. From then on, he was brought up by his mother. It is said that the young boy had made an attempt to apply for his father’s bank manager job on compassionate grounds. His mother had retired from the bank in 2017 and has been suffering from a serious mobility issue. The boy had also failed his class 12 exams.

How the case came to light:

There are two SBI branches in Panruti and Venkatesh is the manager of one of them. He was asked by a customer about a third branch functioning in the North Bazaar area and told him that the receipt, withdrawal slip and seal (of the new branch) are available. Shocked on knowing this, the manger reached out to the cops and filed a complaint. The cops zeroed-in on the boy.

The investigation officer said, “He was very keen on getting the bank manager job after his father died while on duty (13 years ago). After turning 18 yrs of age the boy applied for the bank job and he was eagerly waiting. But, the boy’s application was not accepted.” It was during the recent months that the boy also got started with the basic work to run a bank branch. With the help of local printers and suppliers, he got the challans, documents and seals ready. However, he did not use a name board to depict it was a bank branch.

The local suppliers who arranged the seals and documents told cops that they helped the boy considering that his parents were bank staff and assuming his reasons were legitimate. The Panruti Station Police registered an FIR under Sections 471, 473, 468 and 109 IPC. The boy and his accomplices were arrested and remanded and later the magistrate granted them bail.

The cops said that forgery of documents and seals have happened in this case. But the public have not come up and registered complaints of them losing money or being cheated by this individual/group in the guise of a bank.

“It is learnt that the boy is an adopted child and it was kept secret all this while. The family suspects that he has gotten to know about being an adopted child. His mother and aunt who live with him were totally unaware of his activities. Although the boy has extraordinary knowledge of banking transactions, he has a very innocent, childlike demeanour. He was obsessed with the bank job and that’s what led him to forge the documents and seals and set-up a bank at home,” said Ambethkar, the investigating officer.