A caller purporting to be the PM's office got Rs 60 lakh from an SBI branch in 1971. Nagarwala was convicted in three days; the verdict was set aside.
After the March 1971 crackdown in East Pakistan, refugees poured into India and war looked likely. A secret payment for Bangladesh sounded plausible.
At about noon, a caller purporting to be P.N. Haksar told chief cashier Ved Prakash Malhotra the PM needed Rs 60 lakh. A female voice then purported to be the PM.
Malhotra had the box taken from the strong room and drove off. Near Bible House he met Nagarwala, who gave the code words. There was no cheque or voucher.
Malhotra went to the PM's residence but could not see her, then met Haksar at Parliament House. Haksar said no money had been requested. Police were told.
From a noon phone call to a night arrest: Rs 59,95,000 was recovered the same day.
Police traced Nagarwala to a Parsi dharamshala and arrested him that night. Rs 59,95,000 was recovered from a house in Defence Colony.
On 27 May Nagarwala made a confessional statement, was charged, pleaded guilty and was sentenced the same day, reportedly to four years. He later recanted.
On appeal the first conviction was set aside and a fresh trial ordered. New charges of impersonation and cheating were framed on 9 August 1971.
Nagarwala asked for Malhotra to be made a co-accused. The court refused: the record did not show his involvement in a crime. Police had arrested him days earlier.
D.K. Kashyap, who led the investigation, died in a road accident in November 1971. The exact date is not in the sources checked.
The High Court held Malhotra was duped and showed no dishonesty, though he may have broken bank rules. It noted police were far slower on his case.
As the High Court noted on 24 November 1971: Nagarwala's case took three days; Malhotra's was incomplete after about six months.
Business Standard reports he died on 22 March 1972, his fiftieth birthday, of a reported heart attack. Some accounts say 2 March. His case ended unresolved.
Rs 60 lakh taken, Rs 59,95,000 recovered, convicted within 3 days, and a Reddy Commission report of about 820 pages.
After the Janata government took office in 1977, retired Supreme Court judge P. Jaganmohan Reddy was asked to examine the Nagarwala affair.
The 1978 report of about 820 pages faulted police, courts and bank, found no evidence the money was the PM's, and said the confession should have been rejected.
The commission found fault with the police, courts and bank, but not who made the call, whose voice it was or why.
Read the complete story, FAQs and key facts.