IMA staff ‘loot’ cash, landlords help them

The owners of a building that housed Frontline Pharma’s JP Nagar store allegedly helped the staff take away medicines and cash a week ago. That’s not all, the landlords even removed Rs 50 lakh worth of office paraphernalia and stored them away so that they can rent the place to someone else.

Frontline Pharma was the pharmacy chain run by the so-called Halal investment company, I Monetary Advisory (IMA), which went bust on June 10, duping thousands of investors. The Special Investigation Team (SIT) on Wednesday said it had arrested the landlords — identified as Muruli, 41, and Muniraju, 34. It also booked the staff of Frontline Pharma but did not disclose their identity.

The theft emerged when SIT sleuths led by police inspector Sadiq Pasha went to Frontline Pharma at 14th Cross, JP Nagar, with a search warrant and found the store empty.

When questioned by the investigators, Muruli and Muniraju said that a few employees had come a week ago and vacated the shop in a hurry. They took away only medicines and cash and left other things — a computer, a fan, a refrigerator, a CCTV DVR, sales counter, racks and other furniture — untouched.

The landlords later broke open the store, removed the paraphernalia and stored them in their house.

They even removed the signboard and cleaned up the store so that they can rent it again. A senior police officer said the value of the paraphernalia was estimated at Rs 50 lakh.

The SIT has seized all the items and booked the landlords.

An officer said the landlords cleaned up the store despite knowing that all pharmacies owned by IMA were under the investigation.

The landlords claimed they cleaned up the store so as to secure their property but the officer said their actions amounted to theft, cheating and mischief to cause damage and trespass.