In a Defraudation case, Ashish Lata Ramgobin who is the great-grandaughter of Mahatma Gandhi has been found guilty by the Durban court. The verdict on 6 million rand fraud and forgery case, the Durban Specialised Commercial Crime Court (South Africa) has sentenced the 56-year-old to seven years in jail on Monday.
Ashish Lata Ramgobin, who is well-known as Mahatma Gandhi’s great-grandaughter was accused of defrauding SR Maharaj, a businessman. As per to the reports, she has taken more than R6 million from SR Maharaj for apparently clearing the import as well as customs duties for a non-existent shipment coming from India. In addition to that, the business was also promised to get a share out of the gains or profits.
The trial case against Lata Ramgobin on the same matter was initially started back in the year 2015. The National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) spokesperson Brigadier Hangwani Mulaudzi had stated that she has purportedly offered forged invoices as well as the documents to persuade to the prospective investors that the three linen containers has been shipped in the country from India. However, Lata Ramgobin back then was set free on a bail of 50,000 rand at that time.
On Monday, on the day of court hearing and her sentencing, the court was informed that Ashish Lata Ramgobin in August 2015 met the New Africa Alliance Footwear Distributors director, SR Maharaj. The company is mainly involved in importing as well as manufacturing and selling the clothing, footwear, and linen products.
The businessman SR Maharaj’s company also helps in providing finances to other small or big companies in term of profit sharing basis. Back then when Lata Ramgobin met Maharaj in 2015, she informed him that she has already imported three linen containers to South Africa from India for the South African Hospital Group NetCare.
She then asked him for R6.2 million financial help and said that she is in need of money as she was facing financial problems. She claimed that she needed money for the payment for import costs and customs duty for which she has also showed Maharaj the documents, invoice and delivery note in order to convince him that the goods were delivered earlier but the payment was impending.
After getting convinced by the NetCare documents that she presented to him and also her family background, Maharaj agreed to enter into a written agreement with Lata Ramgobin for advancing her the loan.
Soon after getting under the written agreement, Maharaj realised that the documents given by Lata Ramgobin were fake and were forged. He also found out that NetCare has also not signed any agreement with Lata Ramgobin. After which he immediately filed criminal charges against her for which she was sentenced seven years in jail in South Africa by Durban court and the verdict was announced in the case last court hearing on Monday.
Apart from being Mahatma Gandhi’s great-grandaughter, Ashish Lata Ramgobin is also the daughter of well-known rights activists named Ela Gandhi and late Mewa Ramgobind. She is also a part of non-violence NGO organisation for which she is also a founder and executive director.
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