Mumbai: The special PMLA court has rejected the bail of Amar Mulchandani, former Chairman of Seva Vikas Co-operative Bank observing that he was prima facie directly involved in generating proceeds of crime and siphoning of the amount.
Mulchandani had moved bail plea claiming the predicate offence based on which ED had initiated the probe has been closed. Though the agency claims it has subsumed three predicate offences to launch the money laundering probe, it is contrary to the provisions of PMLA.
The ED on the other hand had said that, Mulchandani was the Chairman of Seva Vikas Co-operative Bank (In short ‘SVB’) from the year 1997-2003 and from the year 2009-2020. He made his family members and associated persons directors of SVB in order to run the bank single handedly and to sanction the loans without any resistance from other board of Directors of SVB. As majority of the board of Directors of Bank were handpicked by applicant/accused, he used to sanction the loans without holding any meeting or consent of the Board of Directors.
ED further claimed that, the accused flouted banking norms in sanctioning loans to ineligible borrowers without ascertaining their repaying capacity. As a result, 124 loan accounts were declared NPA by the SVB wherein, misappropriation of Rs.429.57 Crores was observed which accounted for 92% of the loans of SVB. It is further pleaded that applicant/accused has sanctioned the loans, obtained commission in cash which reflects from withdrawal by cash on the same day
Judge Relies On SC Orders
The special PMLA judge AC Daga, relying on the Supreme court orders and high court orders rejected defence arguments and held that the subsume of subsequent FIRs is legal, therefore, ECIR can proceed further.
Further, “The statement recorded by the officer of ED regarding witnesses and documents obtained by the officer of ED goes to show that applicant had sanctioned the loans to ineligible borrowers by flouting the banking norms in lieu of kickbacks of 20 percent of sanctioned amount in cash. This has been highlighted as the modus operandi by withdrawing of 20 percent of cash from the loan account immediately after sanctioning of loan. Due to sanctioning of such loan to ineligible borrowers, without verifying the documents, as a result, 124 loan accounts were declared NPA by the SVB wherein, misappropriation of Rs.429.57 Crores,” the court noted adding that no case is made out for bail.
Images are for reference only.Images and contents gathered automatic from google or 3rd party sources.All rights on the images and contents are with their legal original owners.
Comments are closed, but trackbacks and pingbacks are open.