The Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of the Delhi Police has arrested the Chief Financial Officer of Reliance Power Limited and two others for allegedly submitting fake bank guarantees worth more than Rs 136 crore to win a tender from the Solar Energy Corporation of India (SECI).
The arrested persons are:
Ashok Kumar Pal (50), CFO of Reliance Power Ltd
Partha Sarthi Biswal (54), Managing Director of Odisha-based Biswal Tradelink Pvt Ltd
Amarnath Dutta (50), a resident of Kolkata
According to the police, Reliance NU BESS Ltd — a subsidiary of Reliance Power — submitted two forged bank guarantees of Rs 68.20 crore each during a tender process floated by SECI. The guarantees were supposedly issued by foreign banks.
To make the documents look genuine, the accused allegedly created fake email communications and fabricated confirmations from the State Bank of India (SBI) through the Structured Financial Messaging System (SFMS). SBI later confirmed that these documents were fake.
The case was registered on June 24 last year after a complaint by SECI manager Biblesh Meena. Police say Ashok Kumar Pal conspired with Biswal and Dutta to arrange the forged guarantees through middlemen by paying large sums of money for the fake documents.“Ashok Kumar Pal conspired with the co-accused to arrange forged bank guarantees from foreign banks to secure the tender with SECI,” said Deputy Commissioner of Police Subodh Kumar Goswami of the EOW.
All three were arrested on April 15 and have been sent to police custody till April 23.Pal is a qualified chartered accountant who has been working with the Reliance ADAG group since 2018. Biswal, who is only Class 12 pass, allegedly acted as an intermediary through his company. Dutta, who holds a BCA degree and a diploma in import-export, worked as a middleman in the alleged scam. Further investigation is ongoing.
