The Enforcement Directorate (ED), acting on an FIR filed in Pune alleging loan fraud, has attached 47 immovable properties worth Rs. 121.81 crore, and movable assets worth Rs. 54.25 lakh, belonging to Pune-based Seva Vikas Cooperative Bank's former chairman Amar Mulchandani, Rosary Education Group's Vinay Aranha, Sagar Suryawanshi, Khemchand Bhojwani and their family members/related entities, under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).
A report by the Joint Registrar (Audit) revealed gross fraud and misappropriation of Rs 429.6 crore across 124 non-performing asset (NPA) loan accounts in the bank, leading to FIRs against loan beneficiaries and the bank management. This also prompted the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to cancel the bank's licence. The FIR alleges that small deposits by thousands of depositors were siphoned off through illegal loans sanctioned by the bank's management.
The ED has claimed that Amar Mulchandani treated the bank's public deposits "like his personal fiefdom and violated all prudent banking norms" to illegally sanction loans to his favoured borrowers in lieu of a 20 percent commission on the borrowed amount.
Mulchandani has allegedly sanctioned loans without adequate collateral securities or verifying the creditworthiness of borrowers. The ED's probe has found that Mulchandani added his family members as directors of the bank to ensure a brute majority in the board. The agency has claimed that several bogus loans were sanctioned to siphon off money, as many borrowers were hand-in-glove with Mulchandani.
The ED is probing how new loans were sanctioned to repay older loans as several benami investments made by the accused have been traced.
In January this year, the ED
had seized assets worth over Rs 3 crore during raids at 10 locations in connection with the case.
