NEW DELHI: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Saturday filed a case against ABG Shipyard Limited and its directors/promoters Rishi Kamlesh Agarwal, Santhanam Muthaswamy, Ashwani Kumar, Sushil Kumar Agarwal and Ravi Vimal Nevetia for allegedly duping 28 banks of Rs 22,842 crore.
It was alleged that the accused had cheated the consortium of 28 banks including the branches of the erstwhile State Bank of Patiala, Commercial Finance Branch, New Delhi, the erstwhile State Bank of Travancore, Commercial Branch, New Delhi, State Bank of India, Overseas Branch, Mumbai etc. The consortium was led by ICICI Bank, a CBI press release said.
If found to be true, this would rank as the biggest bank-loan fraud reported in the country, dwarfing those involving Nirav Modi and Vijay Mallya.
CBI spokesperson RC Joshi said the accused had allegedly colluded and pulled off the fraud through fund diversions that were then used to purchase assets. He said huge investments were made in the overseas subsidiaries.
The CBI had swung into action after a complaint lodged by the State Bank of India. CBI teams conducted searches at 14 locations spread across Surat, Bharuch, Mumbai and Pune on Saturday during which it recovered documents that implicated the firm and those managing it.
ABG Shipyard, an offshoot of the ABG Group of companies, is based at Dahej and Surat and involved in building ships and repairing them.
According to the FIR, the accused company allegedly owes Rs 7,089 crore to ICICI Bank, Rs 3,639 crore to IDBI Bank, Rs 2,925 crore to SBI, Rs 1327 crore to Exim Bank of India and Rs 1243 crore to Punjab National Bank, Rs 1228 crore to Indian Overseas Bank and rest to other banks and financial institutions.
ALSO WATCH |