Man stays at Delhi 5-star hotel for nearly 2 years with Rs 58 lakh unpaid bill

Roseate House has filed a case with the Delhi Police. (Image: @roseatehouse/Facebook)

Roseate House, a five-star hotel located near the Indira Gandhi International Airport in Delhi, has claimed massive financial loss amounting to Rs 58 lakh after one of its guests, in connivance with certain hotel staff, stayed at the hotel for nearly two years without paying a single penny. The hotel has filed a police case against Ankush Dutta and one of their staff.

Vinod Malhotra, a representative of Bird Airports Hotel Private Limited, the company operating Roseate, lodged a First Information Report (FIR) detailing the incident. Malhotra asserts that Ankush Dutta's 603-day stay incurred a staggering cost of Rs 58 lakh, which he intentionally evaded before checking out.

The FIR accuses Prem Prakash, the head of the Front Office Department, who possessed the authority to determine room rates and access the hotel's computer system for tracking guest dues, of deliberately flouting hotel policies to accommodate Dutta's prolonged stay.

The hotel's management suspects that Prakash may have accepted illicit cash payments from Dutta in exchange for manipulating the hotel's in-house software system. This system is designed to maintain and monitor the duration and financial accounts of guests.

The FIR states, "A criminal conspiracy was hatched by guest Mr. Ankush Dutta along with some known and unknown hotel staff, including Mr. Prem Prakash, with a motive to gain wrongfully and deprive the hotel of its rightful dues."

Furthermore, it alleges that the staff involved forged, deleted, and added account entries while falsifying numerous records within Dutta's account in the hotel's Opera software system.

According to the allegations, Ankush Dutta initially checked into Roseate House on May 30, 2019, booking a room for a single night. However, instead of adhering to the designated checkout date of May 31, he continuously extended his stay until January 22, 2021.

As per the hotel's regulations, if a guest's outstanding dues exceed 72 hours, the CEO and Financial Controller must be informed. Prakash neglected to report Dutta's pending dues to the hotel's higher authorities.

The FIR further reveals that Prakash deliberately refrained from creating outstanding payment reports from May 30, 2019, to October 25, 2019. Even when he finally generated the report after October 25, he deceitfully combined pending bills from unrelated guests, concealing Dutta's outstanding charges within the consolidated bill.

Roseate House contends that Prakash employed various tactics to enable Dutta's prolonged stay, including fabricating accounts to suggest that other guests had made payments on his behalf - a claim that was later exposed as fictitious.

Moreover, the hotel discovered that Ankush Dutta issued three checks, each worth Rs 10 lakh, Rs 7 lakh, and Rs 20 lakh, on different dates. All of these checks bounced, and Prakash intentionally concealed this information from the hotel management.

Demanding severe legal action against the culprits, Roseate House argues that they have committed a series of criminal offenses, including criminal breach of trust, cheating, forgery, and falsification of accounts.

(With inputs from PTI)