MOTHER OF ALL SCAMS

Every time I pass by the State Bank of India on Parliament Street, New Delhi, I am reminded of Nagarwala and how effortlessly the conman duped the bank of Rs 60 lakh in cash.

- AJ Philip

This memory is especially vivid now that the present government has insisted that all non-government organisations (NGOs) in India with accounts under the Foreign Currency Regulation Act transfer to this particular branch.

I was a college student on May 24, 1971, when Rustom Sohrab Nagarwala called the Chief Cashier of the bank, VP Malhotra, and asked him over the phone to withdraw Rs 60 lakh and deliver it to an unidentified person who would utter a code word. The retired Army captain mimicked both PN Haksar, who was the Prime Minister's secretary, and Mrs. Gandhi herself during the same conversation.

Many, like me, wondered how a senior bank official could be so gullible as to fall for Nagarwala's trap and deliver the money in two trunks to a man who claimed he would transport it by aircraft for an operation in Bangladesh. Even worse, Malhotra believed he would receive a receipt from the Prime Minister for the large sum delivered to the man, who turned out to be Nagarwala himself.