CHENNAI: The CBI booked a bank manager, two bank officers, a temporary staff and an armed guard for allegedly swindling Rs 3.28 crore from the Bank of Baroda currency chest in Coimbatore.
While sorting out soiled note remittances worth Rs 70.40 crore, Reserve Bank of India officials were surprised to find discrepancies worth Rs 2.83 crore in the currency chest at the Nanjappa Road branch, on December 27, 2021. The soiled notes were in the denominations of Rs 2,000, Rs 500, Rs 200 and Rs 100.
On January 8, 2022, RBI officials subsequently conducted a snap audit of the currency chest and observed a shortage of Rs 45 lakh. They also found certain counterfeit or mutilated notes. These discrepancies were observed till January 12, 2022.
During the bank's preliminary probe, CCTV footage was analysed where unusual transactions were found in the accounts of a few staff members. As per footage from May 28, 2021 and December 8, 2021, Kanagaraj, the armed guard, attached to the currency chest, was seen sorting the cash, neglecting his primary duty.
Temporary employee A Srikanth, attached to the currency chest, was seen removing notes from the cash bundle before keeping them in the cash bin.
This was done in the presence of custodians of the currency chest: Bank officer R Selvarajan, manager M Rajan, bank officer S Jayasankaran and senior manager V Vijayalakshmi (who passed away due to Covid-19 on January 16, 2022). These officials were responsible to ensure correctness and safekeeping of cash in the chest by being vigilant, the bank investigation reveals.
The report said many suspicious transactions were found in the accounts of Srikanth and R Selvarajan, maintained with Bank of Baroda. It observed that Srikanth had accounts with SBI, Indian Bank, Karur Vysya Bank and City Union Bank. There were financial transactions between the accounts of Rajan and Srikanth, it added.
A case was registered after KR Kagadal, BoB deputy general manager, (Regional Head) Coimbatore lodged a complaint. Selvarajan, Rajan, Jayasankaran, Kanagaraj and Srikanth were booked under Prevention of Corruption Act (as amended in 2018). R Balaji, Inspector, CBI, Anti-corruption Bureau (ACB) investigated the case.