NEW DELHI: The Central Bureau of Investigation has registered a case against Dewan Housing Finance Corporation promoters Kapil Wadhawan, Dheeraj Wadhawan and others for defrauding a consortium of 17 banks to the tune of Rs 34,615 crore, making it the biggest banking fraud probed by the agency. Following registration of the case on June 20, the CBI on Wednesday carried out coordinated searches on 12 properties of the accused in Mumbai.
“Searches were conducted at 12 locations in Mumbai at the premises of accused, which led to recovery of incriminating documents,” the CBI said. The CBI action follows a complaint from the Union Bank of India, leader of the 17-member consortium which had extended credit facilities to the tune of `42,871 crore between 2010 and 2018.
The complaint alleged that the Wadhawan brothers and DFL director Sudhakar Shetty along with other accused entered into a criminal conspiracy to cheat the banks. The FIR also names Amaryllis Realtors LLP, Gulmarg Realtors LLP, Skylark Buildcon, Darshan Developers, Sigtia Constructions, Creator Builders, Township Developers, Shishir Realty, Sunblink Real Estate and other unknown persons including public servants.
The accused allegedly cheated the consortium by siphoning off loans after creating shell companies. The audit of DHFL account books showed the company allegedly committed financial irregularities, diverted funds, fabricated books, round tripped funds to “create assets for Kapil and Dheeraj Wadhawan” using public money. Both are in judicial custody in connection with previous fraud cases. The DHFL loan accounts were declared NPAs at different points of time by the lenders.
Bandra Books
DHFL allegedly maintained as many as 1,81,664 ghost retail loan accounts having liability of over Rs 14,000 crore, which were kept in a parallel set of accounts database known as ‘Bandra Books’, officials said