Gurgaon, India — In December 2015, a man identifying himself as Om Prakash walked into an Axis Bank branch in Palam Vihar, Gurgaon, and opened a savings account. He presented documents that appeared routine: proof of identity, address verification, and supporting paperwork. Nothing on its face suggested anything extraordinary.
Except Om Prakash had been dead for more than 22 years.
Police say the man at the bank counter was Navin Rana, a practising lawyer, who had assumed the identity of Prakash, a former resident of Bajghera village who died in 1993. Two days after the account was opened, ₹46 lakh was deposited into it — payment for land sold to Angel Buildtech Private Limited, a real estate firm. The transaction, unusually large for a newly opened account, triggered Axis Bank’s internal alerts. On January 1, 2016, the account was frozen.
It would have been the end of the matter. It wasn’t.
How the Money Stayed in Motion
Despite the freeze, the account quietly resurfaced months later. In October 2016, it was transferred from the Palam Vihar branch to Axis Bank’s Sadar Bazaar branch. For nearly two years, the transaction remained unresolved — a dormant anomaly in a system designed to move faster than it investigates.
The break came in 2018, when bank officials attempted to verify the land deal with Angel Buildtech. Sensing irregularities, the company traced Om Prakash’s family, only to discover that he had died decades earlier and that his relatives had long since left Bajghera.
Angel Buildtech alerted authorities. Om Prakash’s family filed a police complaint alleging cheating and forgery, leading to an FIR against Rana at Bajghera police station. The investigation confirmed what the paper trail had concealed: the bank account, the sale deed, and the identity itself were built on forged documents.
Yet even then, the case stalled. A compromise was reached between parties, and the Punjab and Haryana High Court later quashed the FIR. The criminal case receded, but the money did not return.
Forged Documents, Second Chances
Angel Buildtech pursued a civil case to recover its funds. In 2023, a court ordered Axis Bank to return the money. But by then, the account — once frozen — had been quietly reactivated.
According to investigators, Rana used fresh forged paperwork to unfreeze the account, transfer the funds to IDFC Bank, and siphon off nearly ₹59 lakh, including accrued interest. The money was moved into his personal accounts through NEFT and IMPS transfers, leaving the bank and the buyer with little more than transaction records and unanswered questions.
The episode exposed vulnerabilities not just in document verification, but in institutional memory. An account flagged once, investigators noted, was allowed to resume activity years later with limited scrutiny — a gap that proved costly.
The Arrest, and the Questions That Remain
The fraud came to a head in September 2024, when the manager of Axis Bank’s Sadar Bazaar branch filed a complaint after detecting suspicious activity and missing funds. The case was transferred to the Economic Offences Wing, which arrested Rana earlier this week.
During questioning, police say Rana admitted to knowing Om Prakash personally and being aware of his death in 1993. He confessed to impersonating him to sell land, opening a bank account in the deceased’s name, and later using forged documents to access and transfer the frozen funds.
“He is currently practising as a lawyer in Gurgaon courts,” said Sandeep Kumar, a police spokesperson.
An FIR has been registered under multiple provisions of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, including criminal conspiracy, cheating by personation, forgery, and criminal breach of trust. Investigators are now tracing possible accomplices, attempting to recover the siphoned money, and examining whether other forged documents remain in circulation.
For authorities, the case is no longer just about one man and one transaction. It is about how a dead identity moved undetected through banks, courts, and registries for nearly a decade — and what it reveals about the systems meant to prevent exactly that.
