J&K State Cooperative Bank ex-chairman, others charge-sheeted in Rs 223-cr loan scam

Tribune News Service

Jammu, August 11

Two months after the arrest of the former chairman of Jammu and Kashmir State Co-operative Bank Limited (JKSTCB), Mohd Shafi Dar, the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) on Tuesday produced a charge-sheet against him in the much-publicised Rs 223-crore loan scam.

Dar was arrested by the ACB on June 3.

According to the ACB spokesperson, the charge-sheet was produced against Mohd Shafi Dar; Hilal Ahmad Mir, resident Magarmal Bagh, Srinagar, and chairman of the non-existent River Jhelum Co-operative House Building Society (RJCHBS) in Srinagar; and Abdul Hamid Hajam of Hazaratbal, Srinagar, and the secretary of the non-existent RJCHBS.

“An FIR was registered against the former chairman of JKCBL and others in the Srinagar branch of the ACB for allegedly sanctioning a loan to the tune of Rs 250 crores in favour of a non-existent RJCHBS for the purposes of construction of a satellite township at Shiv Pora, Srinagar, bypassing the credit policy of the bank, and on the basis of false and fabricated documents,” the spokesperson said.

The investigation revealed that a conspiracy was hatched between Dar; Hilal Ahmad Mir; Abdul Hamid Hajam; Mohd Mujib Ur Rehman Ghassi, then registrar of the cooperative societies, Jammu and Kashmir; Syed Ashiq Hussain, deputy registrar of the cooperative societies; and others in creating a non-existent society in the year 2018-19 for obtaining a loan from the JKSTCB Bank, Srinagar, and on the false pretext of constructing a satellite township in Shiv Pora and for siphoning out the loan funds so granted.

“A fake and fictitious registration certificate of the society was created by the accused persons and the society’s chairman approached Abdul Majid Bhat, Secretary, Government Co-operative Department, on January 10, 2018, wherein directions were sought from the J-K Co-operative Department to JKSTCB for grant of financial assistance (loan advance) to the tune of Rs 300 crores for the construction of satellite township on 300 ‘kanals’ of proprietary land located in the outskirts of Srinagar city,” the spokesperson said.

It came to fore that the conspiracy of routing the application through the office of the Registrar of cooperative societies was to camouflage the illegal acts of the accused and give it a stamp of government approval as otherwise there was no such precedence of routing loan application through the office of the Registrar for sanction of a loan in favour of a cooperative society.

“The application seeking financial assistance was approved and forwarded to the chairman of JKSTCB by Mohd Mujib Ur Rehman Ghasi for the sanction of the loan. The chairman of the bank, in conspiracy with borrower Hilal Ahmad and others, sanctioned the loan amount of Rs 250 crores in favour of the fictitious society and of that, Rs 223 crore was released,” the spokesperson added.

The whole loan amount was transferred into the account of accused Hilal Ahmad Mir from where the amount was transferred through RTGS/NEFT into the accounts of 18 persons, who are merely presumed to be shareholders or legal heirs of the land measuring 257 ‘kanals’ and 19 ‘marlas’ in Srinagar’s Shiv Pora.

Of the Rs 223-crore loan amount, which was transferred into the accounts of 18 landowners, an amount of Rs 202 crore has been frozen, and the land which was illegally leased out to the fictitious society, has been attached through the government.