Delhi Police has arrested two people for allegedly cheating Indian exporters on the pretext of winning them lucrative orders for home furnishings from overseas buyers.

The exporters appear to have been duped into believing the orders were genuine because they were shown letters of credit (L/Cs), apparently issued by foreign purchasers.

Front operations

Tej Bahadur Rai, proprietor of Falcon India Buying House based in the Okhla Industrial Area of Delhi, and his accomplice, Meenu Sahdev, allegedly duped several exporters, promising them export orders worth hundreds of thousands of US dollars against L/Cs purportedly issued by overseas buyers.

The exporters based in Delhi, Jaipur, Varanasi and Noida were allegedly told that, in order to fulfil the overseas orders, they would have to buy the silk they needed to make the home furnishings from Dhananjay Silk Emporium on advance payment. The emporium appears to have been a front operation of Rai's.

Once the orders were completed, the finished goods were shipped to another Rai front organisation.

No contact

Exporters were told not to contact overseas buyers directly and Rai said it was his business to decide on details such as designs and colour combinations.

The conspirators allegedly cheated fabric suppliers in several states, including Surat, Varanasi and Bhagalpur according to police sources.

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