Punjab Police recovers another Rs 2.13 cr in priest's missing money case
Chandigarh, May 4 (UNI) Further investigations into the Jalandhar priest's missing money case has led the Punjab Police Special Investigation Team (SIT) to recover another Rs 2,13,50,000, taking the total seizure so far to Rs 4,51,50,000.
Stating this here on Saturday, a spokesperson of the Punjab Police said the money was recovered from the accused on the basis of revelations made by the two arrested ASIs during their questioning by SIT.
SIT had successfully trailed both the absconding ASIs - Joginder Singh and Rajpreet Singh - to Kochi where they were apprehended by Kerala Police on Thursday. SIT had then secured their transit remand for further interrogation to get to the bottom of the conspiracy.
Of the seizures made by Patiala Police today, Rs 1.10 crore was recovered from Patiala, based on information by ASI Joginder Singh, while Rs one crore was seized on the disclosures made by arrested ASI Rajpreet Singh.
Another Rs 1.5 lakh was recovered from Gurpreet Singh of Sitarganj in Rudrapur district of Uttarakhand on Friday.
The spokesperson said that in another related development one Gurjant Singh alias Janti of village Shadipur, who runs an immigration firm, in Patiala today appeared before the SIT at Police Lines, Patiala. He informed the SIT that accused ASI Rajpreet Singh had come to him on April 3 at his office and gave him Rs two lakhs for immigration and IELTS of his wife. He feared that the money given to him by ASI Rajpreet may be part of the embezelled amount.
Though he had used part of the amount and deposited the remaining in his bank account, he handed over the said amount to the SIT. He also intimated SIT that the he had CCTV recordings of the visit of ASI Rajpreet to his office which he would handover as evidence.
Gurjant had learnt from newspapers about arrest of ASI Rajpreet Singh, and that's why he approached Patiala Police, who had presented him before the SIT which recorded his statement and took over custody of the money after completing procedural formalities.
Punjab DGP Dinkar Gupta, who tweeted about the seizures, appealed to people to come forward with any such information about the case which can further assist police in cracking the case.
Investigations were ongoing and full amount alleged to have been embezzled would be recovered, he said, adding the complete conspiracy would soon be unraveled.
It may be recalled that immediately after taking over custody of two absconding ASIs, SIT had recovered Rs 2.38 crore on Thursday.
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