City
Epaper

HDIL Chairman, MD arrested in PMC Bank case (2nd Lead)

By IANS | Published: October 03, 2019 7:38 PM

The Chairman and Managing Director of real estate developer HDIL were arrested on Thursday in connection with the Rs 6,500 crore loan default case that has hit the Punjab & Maharashtra Co-operative (PMC) Bank.

Open in App

Accordingly, Rakesh Kumar Wadhawan, the Chairman, and Sarang Wadhawan, Managing Director of HDIL were arrested by the Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of the Mumbai Police.

Besides, the assets of HDIL worth Rs 3,500 crore have also been frozen.

BJP Maharashtra Vice President and former Mumbai MP Kirit Somaiya added that the Mumbai Police EOW will also arrest PMC Bank's Chairman Wareyam Singh and former Managing Director Joy Thomas.

Last week, the Mumbai Police EOW had registered an FIR against senior officials of HDIL and PMC Bank over allegedly causing losses to the tune of Rs 4,355.43 crore to the bank.

The FIR mentioned PMC Bank's MD Thomas, Chairman Singh and other executives. It also mentions involvement of Sarang Wadhawan, the Vice Chairman and Managing Director of HDIL.

The EOW had also appointed a special team to carry out investigations into the case.

As per the complaint, the bank officials, between 2008 and 2019, deliberately violated banking norms and showed false profits to mislead the authorities, although the bank was actually incurring losses.

It also said that the bank also veiled the group's large exposure and non-performing assets (NPAs) from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) by creating dummy accounts.

The bank had allegedly opened a number of dummy accounts to replace the stressed accounts held by Wadhawans-led HDIL.

Last week, the RBI barred the Punjab & Maharashtra Cooperative Bank Ltd (PMC), Mumbai from carrying out the majority of its routine business transactions for a period of six months, sparking panic among the depositors and sending shockwaves in the city banking and business circles on Tuesday.

In a letter to RBI, Thomas admitted large-scale wrongdoing and the cover-up exercise.

"Some of the large accounts were not reported to RBI from 2008 because of fear of reputational risk," Thomas has revealed in his letter.

He said that in 2011, the size of the bank was around 57 branches with deposits of Rs 2,824 crore and advances of Rs 2,000 crore. The exposure of HDIL group was then Rs 1,026 crore. "Had we classified them as non-performing assets, we would have to stop charging interest on these accounts and we could have made losses. The growth part of the bank would have got hampered."

Thomas, however, said that the bank is still optimistic about the repayment plan of HDIL group and the group always promised to clear the dues and gave backup security to back their loans. The letter further said: "Every year during the course of RBI inspection we undergo a lot of stress due to concealment of information from RBI. It was worrying each of us."

( With inputs from IANS )

Tags: HdilRBIJoy Thomas
Open in App

Related Stories

BusinessRBI Moves 100 Tonnes of Gold Back to India from UK Central Bank

BusinessReserve Bank of India Sees 7% Growth for Indian Economy in Current Fiscal Year

BusinessCredit Card Fraud: Follow These Steps to Get a Refund From Your Bank

BusinessRBI Warns Against Unfair Interest Charges, Orders Lenders to Refund Excess Fees

NationalBank Holidays in May 2024: Banks Across India to Remain Closed for 12 Days Next Month; Check Dates Here

कारोबार Realted Stories

BusinessIndia cementing its position to become a formidable player in defense landscape

BusinessHero MotoCorp witnesses 4 pc drop in sales in May, export rises

BusinessMosChip Technologies secures over Rs 500 cr contract from CDAC

BusinessEaseMyTrip stands firm on Maldives boycott amidst political scrutiny, reports record-breaking financial growth

BusinessMeta purged over 17 mn pieces of bad content on FB, Insta in India in April