PMC Bank fraud: Investigators find another ghost account operator
New Delhi: Not only Housing Development and Infrastructure Ltd (HDIL), but another borrower was also operating ghost accounts in fraud-hit Punjab and Maharashtra Cooperative (PMC) Bank, investigators into the PMC Bank fraud detected.
Abchal Group, that concealed its identity, operated password-protected accounts (much in the manner of HDIL) to which loans to the tune of Rs 300 crore were given and that turned bad debt later.
A leading business daily citing sources said the ‘ghost accounts’ have been operated by entities with the knowledge of arrested bank officials. These accounts allegedly belonged to the Abchal Group.
The publication citing details available with Registrar of Companies (RoC) said Shri Abchal Property Investment Pvt Ltd was incorporated in 1992 with a share capital of Rs 1 lakh. The company is currently struck off by the RoC.
“Details have emerged in the draft forensic report and from interrogations. The accused bankers have accepted that like HDIL, Abchal Group, too, used ghost accounts. Inquiries are being made to ascertain who were the ultimate beneficiaries,” the publication quoted an official as saying.
Worth mentioning here is that HDIL had allegedly tampered with PMC Bank’s core banking solution to operate 44 password-protected accounts. Loans disbursed by the bank to these accounts on overdraft eventually made it to the accounts held by HDIL or its promoters Rakesh and Sarang Wadhawan.
The business daily citing sources mentioned that the Reserve Bank of India-appointed administrator JB Bhoria also plans to implead PMC in the insolvency proceedings against HDIL initiated by Bank of India. In a meeting of the RBI governor, the Maharashtra police Economic Offences Wing (EOW) chief, Enforcement Directorate (ED) officials and Bhoria earlier this week, it was decided to approach the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) to auction the bank’s assets. Those outside the bankruptcy proceedings will be sold by the bank under the Securitisation and Reconstruction of Financial Assets and Enforcement of Securities Interest (Sarfaesi) Act.
On Friday, the ED gave its consent for the sale of two airplanes and a yacht seized by the EOW. It, however, said that consent for the sale of 17 vehicles cannot be given as their disposal will be decided by the adjudicating authority under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).
Counsel for PMC Bank Ramesh Dube-Patil asked that the movable assets be auctioned within a month as these were susceptible to depreciation.
With the ED not giving its consent on the sale of the “depreciable items” and the bank also planning to implead itself before NCLT, relief to the depositors may be delayed, the publication mentioned citing sources.
