In a major breakthrough in the Rs 49,000 crore investment scam, the Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of the Uttar Pradesh Police on Wednesday arrested Gurnam Singh, a former director of Pearl Agro-tech Corporation Limited (PACL), from Rupnagar, Punjab.
EOW Director General Neera Rawat said the arrest was made in connection with a case registered in Jalaun district of Uttar Pradesh. She added that the scam affected nearly five crore investors across 10 states, including Uttar Pradesh, Assam, Punjab, Rajasthan, Delhi, Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala, Bihar, and Chhattisgarh.
Rawat explained that PACL lured investors by promising them land plots in districts like Mahoba, Sultanpur, Farrukhabad, and Jalaun. “The company issued bond receipts without being registered as a non-banking financial company (NBFC) with the Reserve Bank of India. It is alleged that the firm collected approximately Rs 49,000 crore from the public but neither allotted plots nor returned the invested money,” she said.
A senior police officer involved in the probe revealed that Gurnam Singh was found living at a secluded farmhouse near his native village in Rupnagar. “He had earlier been arrested by the CBI in 2016, along with four others, in a related case registered in Delhi between 2012 and 2015. After securing bail six months later, he withdrew from public life and settled at the farmhouse. He was wanted in the Jalaun case since then and was finally arrested on Tuesday. He has been brought to Uttar Pradesh on transit remand and handed over to Jalaun police for further legal proceedings,” the officer added.
The scam’s alleged mastermind, PACL chairman Nirmal Singh Bhangoo, was lodged in Tihar Jail before he died last year. In 2016, the CBI had arrested Bhangoo and three other company officials in the Delhi case. Two years later, in 2018, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) filed a chargesheet against PACL and Bhangoo, accusing them of orchestrating a massive Ponzi scheme involving more than ₹49,100 crore.
In 2016, the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) had also cracked down on PACL, attaching its bank accounts, demat holdings, and mutual fund investments after the company failed to follow its directives.
PACL, originally incorporated in 1996 as Guruvante Agro-tech Limited with the Registrar of Companies (ROC) in Jaipur, was renamed Pearl Agro-tech Corporation Limited in 2011. Over the years, it expanded its operations across 10 Indian states, raising funds under the guise of land investment schemes.
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