noida

Updated: Jun 22, 2019 18:29 IST

The kingpins of Bike Bot scheme duped 2.25 lakh investors of around ₹1,500 crore and diverted ₹650 crore to different accounts, before two of them were held by police earlier in June. The accused bought luxury cars, including Jaguar, Audi and Range Rover, from the money, police said, adding that five directors of the company are on the run.

Vaibhav Krishna, senior superintendent of police, Gautam Budh Nagar, on Friday said that mastermind Sanjay Bhati (42), owner of Garvit Innovative Promoters Ltd who holds diploma in mechanical engineering, launched this fictitious company in 2010, which floated Bike Bot scheme in 2017.

Notably, Bhati was announced as candidate for Gautam Budh Nagar Lok Sabha seat by the Bahujan Samaj Party, but his candidature was cancelled following registration of cases against him.

Krishna said the modus operandi was lucrative. The accused would seek ₹62,000 investment per bike from people. “The investors were promised ₹9,765 monthly return from their investment. A sum of ₹4,590 was towards bike rent and ₹5,175 per month as profit share. This accumulated to ₹1.17 lakh per annum income,” he said. The offer was so lucrative that soon a number of people made payments for multiple bikes.

The company’s head office was in Bhati’s native village — Chiti in Dankaur. Later, the promoters opened regional offices in Noida, Greater Noida, Aligarh, Ghaziabad, Saharanpur, Muzaffarpur, Delhi, Jaipur, Haryana, among others. The accused had bought around 10,000 petrol bikes and also procured a few e-bikes.

The scam surfaced after a complainant Sunil Kumar Meena, a resident of Jaipur, filed an FIR against the Bike Bot operator at Dadri police station on February 14 this year against Sanjay Bhati and five directors of the company – Rajesh Bharadwaj, Sunil Kumar Prajapati, Dipti Behl, Sachin Bhati, and Karan Pal Singh. Meena had entered into an agreement with Bhati to get a franchise of bike taxi in Jaipur in October 2018. He paid ₹34 lakh in the account of Gravit Innovative Promoters Pvt Ltd. The company had promised him Jaipur franchise with 51 bikes.

“The scheme was like any other bike aggregator companies operating in the NCR. But the company promised high returns, salary to the drivers from its own coffers and also to pay the credit returns to the owners,” Meena said in his complaint. He had received information about this scheme from a bank manager in Jaipur. Meena made the investment and was promised ₹6.45 lakh monthly returns. However, he received only ₹66,000 for a month. When he did not receive any returns for next few months, he got suspicious, police said.

Meena then started pursuing the matter with the company officials. “The company officials informed me that these bikes are only showpieces. We earn money after adding more investors in the network. If you want to earn money, you should add more people,” Meena said in the FIR. The company sent 26 bikes to Meena. He was promised ₹75 lakh returns in one year for his ₹34 lakh investment, but he did not get the returns.

A case was registered at Dadri police station under Section 420 (cheating), Section 467, Section 471 and Section 408 of IPC.

Bhati had surrendered in the Surajpur court on June 7, while his aide Vijay Pal Kasna was arrested from Meerut a day earlier. The police took them on remand and based on their revelations, raids were conducted at the office located in Chiti village.

Police recovered 102 bikes, some burnt and unburnt documents and several SUVs from the spot. Police have also seized one Range Rover Sport 3.0, 12 Toyota Fortuners, four Mahindra Boleros, seven Maruti Vitara Brezzas, three Tata Nexons, one Mahindra TUV 300 and three Mahindra Scorpios.

The SP said that Noida police formed a special investigation team (SIT), which found that the accused had duped ₹1,500 crore from these investors in the past two years. During interrogation, Bhati said that he had diverted ₹650 crore to the other company’s account. Police said they are following the money trail.

Police said 37 FIRs have been registered against the accused at different police stations. “We will seek the accused’s remand again to get more information. We are also making raids to arrest the absconding co-directors,” Krishna said.