A gang of criminals reportedly forged bank cheques, official seals and signatures to withdraw over ₹14 lakh from one of the bank accounts of the Trinamul-run Balurghat municipality.

The money, sources with the civic body said, was taken out from one bank account of the municipality in three phases on Tuesday and Wednesday. Then, the money was deposited in three separate bank accounts.

The civic authorities filed a police complaint on Wednesday.

They also initiated an investigation on their own on how this could have happened.

Ashok Mitra, the civic chairman, said: “We found a total sum of ₹14,40,068 had been withdrawn on November 12 and November 13 in parts from an account of the Balurghat civic body that is in the local branch of a nationalised bank. Those who withdrew the money have duplicated bank cheques. The original cheques are still with us.”

“We have informed officials of the bank concerned and asked them to see to it that the money is transferred to our account. A complaint has been filed at the Balurghat police station. We suspect that an organised racket is behind this,” added Mitra.

A representative of the bank's branch said they did not have information about such transactions.

“Still, we are checking if such fraudulent activity happened with the bank account (the civic body's bank account),” he said.

Based on the complaint, the police have started an investigation.

Police officers visited the civic body as well as the bank on Thursday to gather details about the bank account, the transactions and the other three accounts.

“We are probing the case. Our officers are collecting information about the suspected fraud,” said Chinmoy Mittal, the superintendent of police of South Dinajpur district.