Torres Jewellery Scam: Whistleblower Abhishek Gupta Seeks Police Protection; Bombay HC Directs EOW To Be Added As Respondent To Plea

Mumbai: So, there’s this big mess with Torres Jewellery, right? Abhishek Gupta, a 31-year-old chartered accountant, claims he blew the whistle on a massive fraud. He’s now asking the Bombay High Court for police protection because he’s worried about his safety.

Apparently, this jewellery chain has scammed over 1.25 lakh investors out of a whopping Rs 1,000 crore. That’s a lot of money! The court has told Gupta to include the Economic Offences Wing (EOW) in his case, and they’ll be hearing it on January 13.

Gupta says he’s a “vulnerable witness” and fears for his life. He’s named several directors of the company in his plea, claiming they might want to silence him. He found some shady stuff in their accounts and tried to raise the alarm.

Things got really intense when he went to their office in Lower Parel. He says three Ukrainian guys threatened him and even tried to bribe him with Rs 5 crore to keep quiet. When he said no, he started getting threats and even faced some attacks from unknown people.

He filed complaints with the police, but nothing happened. He submitted an audit report showing all the irregularities and alerted the Enforcement Directorate and other agencies.

Gupta’s plea also mentions that some Ukrainian nationals were involved in the company without proper permission. The whole scam promised investors crazy returns, like 4% to 10% a week, which is just wild. It all blew up when investors started demanding their money back outside a Torres store in Dadar.

The EOW is now on the case and has filed an FIR under the Maharashtra Protection of Depositors Act. Some directors have been arrested, but the Ukrainian guys have skipped town. They’ve even issued Lookout Circulars for them.

Torres Jewellery kicked off in February 2024, opening shops all over Mumbai with these tempting investment schemes that ended up defrauding so many people.