London, September 13, 2004
Roshan Lal
NRI Press
NRI tax expert, head of tax at financial services group Investec, Nipan
Malde came to Britain at the age of 10, was jailed for four years
last week for trying to steal £2 million from his bosses to build
a temple.
Nipan Malde, 43, of Copley Park, Streatham, London, pleaded guilty
in July to siphoning money from the company, using the Inland Revenue
as an unwitting conduit.
He instructed Investec subsidiaries to send cheques to the Revenue
for sums greater than they owed. He then informed the Revenue it had
been overpaid and that refunds should be sent by cheque to Malde's own
business accounts.
The Southwark Crown Court was told that Nipan Malde, 43, who was a
tax expert at Investec Bank, devoted his life to religion. He used the
cash to buy properties in London. But the head of group was finally
discovered when he tried to pocket a further £850,000.
Anthony Arlidge QC, defending, said: "The fraud that was attempted
was that, in various ways, Investec was persuaded to make payments to
the Inland Revenue which were, in fact, overpayments. "The result
of that was that there was then a claim for repayment from the Inland
Revenue to accounts controlled by Mr Malde."
Staff at HSBC became suspicious when he transferred £85,000 into
his own account. Arlidge told the court Malde was motivated by a desire
to create a new temple for the Shree Shree Radhe Krishna Centre, based
in Enmore Street, South Norwood.
He said: "This was a man who wanted to try to raise considerable
sum of money for this religious organisation. The group have a temple
in a garden in South Norwood, but this was not a site they could really
be proud of. His own lifestyle was relatively simple - there is no question
of extravagant living."
Today Judge Nicholas Loraine-Smith told Malde he had been involved
in a 'very serious' crime.
Although almost all the money has been repaid, the judge said the duration
of the scam, which ran from May 2000 to October 2003, left him 'far
from convinced' by Malde's claim that he wanted the money to help build
a temple for an Indian religious sect.
'You stole just under £1m and you were tempted to steal a further
£850,000. If you had not made that last attempt it looks as though
you would never have been caught,' the judge told him.
'You managed to commit these offences because of the senior and trusted
position you held with your employers.'
Investec dismissed Malde last November and subsequently started proceedings
to try to retrieve the funds.
A spokeswoman for Investec said: 'The company would like to reiterate
that no client funds were involved, that most of the money has been
recovered and we expect to recover the entire amount