Owner of Greater Noida's Grand Venice Mall arrested

Greater Noida: In a major crackdown on fraudulent realtors, the Gautam Buddh Nagar police have arrested a builder who is also the owner of Greater Noida's Grand Venice Mall in connection with alleged cases of property fraud and cheating with several buyers. Police officials said that the administration had earlier issued non-bailable warrants (NBW) against the accused.

According to police, the arrested accused has been identified as Satendra Bhasin alias Montu, a resident of Rajendra Nagar area of New Delhi. Cops said that Bhasin was arrested while he had come to meet the Senior Superintendent of Police at Gautam Buddh Nagar police headquarters on Thursday in connection with some matter.

As the senior cop came to know about his criminal history, he immediately called a police team from Kasna police station and arrested the accused.

As per a complaint lodged by a Noida based business Abhishek Gupta at Kasna police station in Greater Noida, Bhasin allegedly cheated him with lakhs of rupees on pretext of providing him shop at grand Venice mall.

Gupta in his complaint alleged that he had booked a shop at Grand Venice mall in 2011 and made full payment to the developer in instalments and bank loan.

The developer had also promised for interest free EMIs till he get possession of his shop. Soon after receiving the full payment, the developer stopped paying any interest while the shop also went undelivered.

After several attempt made by the complainant to contact the developer, he lodged a complaint with Kasna police while a case of fraud was registered against him in connection with the matter.

Senior police officials said that similar cases of fraud are registered against Bhasin in various police stations of the district.

Even the Yamuna Expressway Industrial Development authority (YEIDA) lodged a case of property fraud against Bhasin after a report was presented before the authority's chairman Prabhat Kumar.

"During sustained interrogations it came to light that over a dozen cases of fraud and cheating are registered against the accused in various police station around the Delhi-NCR region while the district administration had already issued NBW against him. The accused used to lure investors with cheap properties and illegally extort money from them. When the property is not delivered to them and they ask for refund, the accused threatened them with life consequences," said Vineet Jaiswal, Superintendent of Police (rural), Gautam Buddh Nagar.

Jaiswal further said that the accused was sent to jail after producing before the court.