How A Conman Lived In Five Star Hotel And Escaped Without Paying Dues Of Rs 58 Lakh – News18
What was supposed to be just an overnight stay turned out to be a 600-day stay.
The forgery came to the fore when the records of the hotel were checked.
In a baffling case of forgery, a man stayed in a five-star hotel for two years and got away without making any payment. The guest, identified as Ankush Dutta, was reportedly from Guwahati and had checked into Hotel Roseate House in Delhi’s Aerocity, just about a kilometre away from Indira Gandhi International Airport in May 2019. What was supposed to be just an overnight stay turned out to be a 600-day stay, availing all the services of the luxury hotel. Ankush Dutta then checked out from the hotel in January 2021 without paying a single penny to the hotel.
The forgery came to the fore when the records of the hotel were checked and it was found that an employee of the hotel was an accomplice in the crime and helped the guest. According to the claims, the hotel claimed that Prem Prakash, the head of the front office department, permitted Dutta’s prolonged stay in violation of hotel policies. The hotel claimed that Prakash had the authority to determine room rates and had access to the hotel’s computer system to monitor all guests’ outstanding balances.
Prakash is suspected of manipulating the internal software system that records and tracks visitors’ stays or visits and their accounts to allow him to stay longer than permitted. It is also suspected that Dutta may have bribed Prakash to cover up the scam. An FIR filed by a representative of Hotel Rosette House has claimed that the hotel suffered losses to the tune of Rs 58 lakh.
A senior police officer said that when a guest has more than Rs 50,000 unpaid dues to the hotel, according to policy, the guest is urged to make the payment but nothing of that sort happened in Ankush Datta’s case as Prakash allegedly removed his name from the daily records. Prakash did not disclose any pending payments between May 30 and October 25, 2019. Even after October 25, he falsified the outstanding payment report by combining unrelated guests’ unpaid invoices into one bill to conceal Dutta’s unpaid balance.
The hotel has demanded strict action against the culprits and an investigation is underway.
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