BHUBANESWAR: The Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of Crime Branch arrested a chartered accountant from New Delhi for his alleged involvement in Punjab National Bank’s (PNB) Rs 6.18 crore loan scam.PNB’s Bhubaneswar Circle head Paresh Kumar Das had lodged a complaint in this connection and EOW had registered a case in September, 2020.The accused, Neeraj Kumar, of Uttam Nagar in Delhi was arrested on July 23 and was brought to Bhubaneswar on transit remand.
In the complaint, Das accused proprietor of M/s KP Solutions Kali Prasad Mishra and other persons of availing cash credit loan for working capital to the tune of Rs 250 lakh in October 2017 from PNB’s Bapuji Nagar Branch by using fake/forged documents and mortgaging various property as collateral security.
The property were mortgaged without the knowledge of their actual owners. The accused had also submitted the documents of a guarantor, who had passed away a few years back.
EOW’s investigation revealed that Neeraj Kumar was working in PNB’s Saheed Nagar branch between 2013 and 2016 as manager (credit). Kumar quit PNB in 2016 but even after resigning, he used to sit at PNB’s Bapuji Nagar Branch and impersonate as a serving bank official.
Another accused of the case, Birendra Kumar Pattanaik, who was working as chief manager of the same branch had reportedly given free access to Kumar to sit inside the bank and carry out the fraud.Pattanaik actively engaged himself in facilitating and arranging loans amounting to crores from PNB’s Bapuji Nagar branch. Pattanaik, Kumar and other accused bank officials had arranged/facilitated loans on the basis of forged documents. After availing the loan, KP Solutions proprietor Kali Prasad transferred lakhs to the bank accounts of Kumar and a few other accused.
The agency had earlier arrested Kali Prasad, then senior manager (credit) of PNB Bapuji Nagar, Srikant Prasad Prusty, then chief manager, Birendra Kumar Pattnaik, manager, Narendra Nayak, of the same branch, and managing director of M/s Ubique Multitech private limited, Prakash Kumar Behera.They had also sanctioned loan of Rs 3.5 crore in favour of M/s Lingaraj Enterprises by mortgaging the residential duplexes of complainant, Prasant Kumar Mohapatra without his knowledge.