Armani files FIRagainst Axis Bank

GURGAON: The Indian arm of the leading global fashion house, Giorgio Armani, has filed a complaint with Gurgaon police against the DLF branch of Axis Bank alleging its failure to stop the transfer of Rs 17.6 lakh from its account to two private firms.
The amount has been transferred to the accounts of two private firms from Giorgio Armani India Pvt Ltd on the basis of 'forged signatures' of the authorized signatories of the company.
This comes almost a fortnight after the DLF branch of Axis Bank lodged an FIR against M/s Shree Raj Tilak Trading Co and M/s Shree Sai Trading Company for allegedly forging the signatures of officials of the affected company. "We have filed the complaint that the bank is also responsible for this illegal transfer of money from our current account and an FIR be registered against the bank," said a top official of Giorgio Armani.
A senior police officer said that they were investigating the case and if they found any evidence of the bank's role in this fraud, they would lodge a case against it. According to police, a Giorgio Armani official has filed a complaint stating that on December 13 he had observed Rs 13,69,280 was transferred from the company's account with the Axis Bank vide two real time gross settlement system (RTGS) on December 10 in favour of Shree Raj Tilak Trading Co.
The official has stated that thorough investigation revealed that the firm had authorized none to transfer the amount. The company has informed police that there was no party/vendor by those names to whom the fund had been transferred.
The firm has suspected that some of the bank officials in connivance with some other unknown persons including the proprietor/owner of Shree Raj Tilak Trading Co fraudulently transferred the huge amount illegally by forging signatures and also the stamp of the company.
The fashion house has submitted before police that the format used for carrying out the fraudulent transactions is never used by their company. "Further, it is shocking that the bank has entertained such RTGS requests from strangers that are not supported by any cheque of the company," it has mentioned.
Earlier Axis Bank had informed police that the request for transferring the amount was done after "checking the signatures of the authorized signatories appearing on the request. They were found to be matching their specimen signatures available on bank records."