THE High Court has delivered a judgment against a former executive of one of Fiji’s major supermarket chains, finding he improperly diverted over $1million in company funds for his own use.
Abhishek Abhimannu, the former chief financial officer of Kalabo Investments Ltd, which operates the Shop N Save Supermarket chain, has been ordered to repay approximately $1.53m to his former employer,
In a ruling last week, Justice Deepthi Amaratunga dismissed Abhimannu’s defence that the payments were part of an “unofficial wages” agreement.
The court found him liable for $1,165,452.56 in misappropriated funds, plus $364,132.08 in interest at a rate of 4 per cent per annum.
The case centred on a series of payments totalling over $1m made from Shop N Save’s accounts to Abhi Properties Ltd, a company owned by Abhimannu, for a residential construction project in Laucala Bay, Suva.
The court heard that these payments, made between 2014 and 2016, were signed off by Abhimannu’s brother, Kavishay, who served as the company’s CEO. Both executives are nephews of the company’s managing director and principal shareholder, Ratan Deo.
The scheme unravelled in April 2016 during a “trigger event” when Mr Deo was alerted to an unusually high overdraft balance.
An internal cash flow statement revealed the substantial payments to Abhimannu’s project. Despite Abhimannu’s claim that this was part of a long-standing verbal agreement for off-the-books salary, the judge found his evidence “inconsistent” and an “afterthought”.
The judgment emphasised that Abhimannu, as a qualified CFO, knew that Mr Deo could not unilaterally approve such large payments without proper corporate authority.
The judge said the defendant took advantage of Deo’s over-reliance on the defendant and his brother and concluded that Abhimannu had breached his fiduciary duties.
The court also dismissed Abhimannu’s counterclaim for redundancy pay, finding he and his brother had voluntarily resigned after being confronted with the evidence.
Justice Amaratunga ordered Abhimannu pay the full judgment sum of $1,529,584.64, along with $9000 in legal costs to Kalabo Investments Ltd within 21 days.
