20th May 2023, Kathmandu
9 persons were arrested including the branch head of Everest Bank for withdrawing lakhs of rupees from a customer’s account
The police arrested 9 employees including the head of the branch on the charge of defrauding customers of more than one and a half crore rupees from the Everest Bank branch located in Itahari, Sunsari.
DSP Rajkumar Rai of District Police Office Sunsari informed that 7 employees including 7 employees and 2 others including 42-year-old Bishwaraj Shakya of Sindhupalchok house, branch head of Everest Bank Itahari, have been arrested for being involved in defrauding customers’ money.
DSP Rai said that they were arrested because they were found to have defrauded the bank accounts of 33 different customers from the Itahari branch of Everest Bank. Those arrested are 34-year-old Niraj Pradhan from Biratnagar, operation in-charge of the Gaighat branch of the bank, 37-year-old supervisor Tura Lama from Kathmandu, junior assistants 27-year-old Manoj Ghimire of Bhojpur Shadanand Municipality-9, 27-year-old Devraj Ghimire of Itahari-7, 27-year-old Ranjit Pandit of Sunsari Amahibelha. And 30-year-old tailor Pavitra Katwal of Ithari-2.
Similarly, DSP Rai said that Shankar Bhujel of Dhanusha and Ajay Khiuju of Bhaktapur Suryavinayak, who was involved in the money fraud gang, were also arrested. Pradhan was arrested by the police on the 22nd of Chaitra last year, while Bhujel was arrested on the 10th of Baisakh, and Khiuju was arrested on the 13th of Baisakh. According to the police, the others were arrested on Friday, Jestha 5.
According to the police, the employees of the bank misused the bank’s computer ID password and embezzled 59 times from November 14, 2022, to March 31, 2023, 1 crore 14 lakhs seventy-five thousand two hundred and eighty-five rupees from various customers of the bank through Connect-IPS.
DSP Rai said that by misusing the banking system, 35 lakh 48 thousand one hundred and 50 rupees were withdrawn and embezzled by activating the customer’s inactive account. Rai said that all the arrested employees, including the arrested employees, have been investigated by the district court in the banking offense and organized crime prevention act 2070 with an extension of time.