CBI files charge sheet against former Manager of Indian Bank, along with 17 others in Rs 45.40 crore fraud CBI said here on Wednesday.
The Central Bureau of Investigation filed a charge sheet against 18 people, including then Branch Manager of Indian Bank, Koyambedu Branch for allegedly causing a loss of Rs 45.40 crore to the Bank.
The national agency had registered a case on July 3 2020 on the grounds of a charge from Indian Bank, Zonal office in Chennai (North) against the branch manager and others on the allegations of cheating the bank by pre-closing the Term Deposit Accounts (Fixed Deposits) standing in the name of Chennai Port Trust with the Bank.
The accused allegedly committed the crime of conspiracy, impersonation, fabrication of false documents, submission of forged documents, misappropriation, breach of trust, and fraudulent transactions that caused a loss of Rs 45.40 crore to the bank, said CBI.
Raids were earlier carried out around 28 places in Tamil Nadu and Kerala, which led to the recovery of several incriminating materials and evidence. During the investigation, 12 persons were arrested, including two foreign nationals, then Branch Manager of Indian Bank and they all are presently in judicial custody, it added.
During the inquiry, it was discovered that the accused allegedly exploited the circumstances of investment of surplus cash available with Chennai Port Trust in the form of Term Deposits (Fixed Deposits) with the bank for earning interest through a limited tender process and also the willingness of the bank to attract investment in the form of term deposits.
The agency reports that the fraudsters exploited the situation to their benefit by approaching the Branch Manager and also Chennai Port Trust and worked on luring the bank manager to participate in the tender. The bank manager, allegedly in conspiracy with other accused, accepted the proposed investment and actively participated in the bidding floated by Chennai Port Trust by quoting an arbitrarily higher interest rate for the proposed investment than the maximum allowable interest rate of the bank with the intention to win the bid.
The bank was successful in five tenders floated by Chennai Port Trust and got the investment in the form of Term Deposits of Rs 100.57 crore during the period between March and May 2020. After the FD was created, the FD receipts (Bond) against the investment were allegedly handed over to the fraudsters by the branch manager instead of delivering the same in person to the investing organization.
The involved fraudsters instead of delivering the original FD receipts to Chennai Port Trust, allegedly made forged FD receipts and submitted the same to CPT, said CBI. The original FDRs were submitted to the bank with a request to pre-close them.
One of the accused impersonated himself as an official of Chennai Port Trust and opened a fake current account through forged documents in the name of CPT, so as to enable to transfer of the amounts cleared from the pre-closure of FDs into the fake current account, it added.
The details of several bank accounts were collected from several persons and the money was transferred into their accounts based on the forged request letter in the name of Chennai Port Trust. The alleged money received in different accounts was subsequently withdrawn and collected by the accused and shared on the basis of the prearranged commission. In that process, the fraud was committed one after another, after each investment was made by the Chennai Port Trust, and the accused duped people of a total of Rs 45.40 crore reports the CBI.
Along with A Sermathi Raja, the CBI has named V Sudalaimuthu, V Manimozhi, N Ganesh, J Selvakumar, A Arun, M Vijay Herald, M Rajesh Singh, S Siyadh, S Afsar, K Zakir Hussain, VS Arumugham, V Jegan, M Mohammed Siyad, M John Mento, SH Noor Mohamed, C Meldar and A Mathusoothanan as accused in its charge sheet.