Four ex-bank officials among 10 booked for Rs 209-cr fraud

Jaipur, March 25

The CBI today registered a case against two former Assistant General Managers (AGMs), two ex-chief managers of Syndicate Bank, and six others for allegedly causing loss of nearly Rs 209 crore to the bank.

Searches were underway at the residences of the accused, a senior CBI official said.

The accused were identified as former AGMs — AK Tiwari and Adarsh Manchanda; chief managers — Santosh Gupta and Deshraj Meena who worked at the bank’s branches in Udaipur and Jaipur, the official said.

Udaipur-based Chartered Accountant Bharat Bomb, his builder brother-in-law Pavitra Kothari, Kothari’s employees — Piyush Jain and Vineet Jain, and builders Shankar Lal Khandelwal and Anoop Bartaria were also booked for the alleged fraud.

A complaint was lodged that the accused hatched a criminal conspiracy to avail home loans/credit facilities from the bank by submitting forged and fabricated documents. The funds then disbursed by the bank’s two branches were diverted and fraudulently siphoned off to the companies owned by the accused, allegedly causing loss of approximately Rs 209 crore to the bank, the official said.

The case has been registered under Sections 420 (cheating), 120B (punishment of criminal conspiracy), 467, 468 (forgery for purpose of cheating) and 471 (using as genuine a forged document) of the IPC and relevant sections of the Prevention of Corruption Act on a complaint filed by the bank, the official said.

“It was alleged in the complaint that the said accused in criminal conspiracy with each other availed home loans and credit facilities from Jaipur and Udaipur branches of Syndicate Bank on the basis of forged and fabricated documents,” CBI spokesperson RK Gaur said here.

“Searches are being conducted today at four places, including Jaipur, Ajmer, at the residential and official premises of the accused,” he said.

Bomb, who is considered the mastermind of the alleged cheating, is facing CBI probe in another case as well and has been in judicial custody since March last year. Besides, one more accused is also said to be in judicial custody and another one on bail. — OC/PTI