breaking news Cbi Books Gtl Infra, bankers in Rs 4,760 Crore bank fraud case
GTL Infra fraudulently obtained loans from a banking consortium of approximately 24 lenders, including Canara Bank, Dena Bank and ICICI Bank, among others, and then misappropriated the majority of the loan proceeds in conspiracy with vendors and certain officials bank, among others. The company was giving advances to vendors from year to year without supply of materials, goods, and eventually those advances were provisioned, CBI said.
The Central Bank of India has registered an FIR against telecom infrastructure giant GTL Ltd. certain unknown bankers and administrators for allegedly misappropriating a substantial part of a loan of Rs 4,760 crore obtained from a consortium of banks led by IDBI Bank, an official said on Thursday.
The investigative agency booked the company, unidentified directors, officials and suppliers under the IPC sections related to criminal association, cheating and the provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act, after that the company fraudulently obtained loans from a banking syndicate of around 24 lenders and then siphoned off the majority of the loan amount in conspiracy with vendors and certain bank officials, among others.
According to the FIR, investigations revealed that GTL Limited gave advances to suppliers from year to year without supply of equipment, goods, and finally these advances were provisioned.
To facilitate the fraud, the perpetrators allegedly set up various supplier companies in collusion with GTL Ltd, the CBI said. Among the banks, ICICI Bank has an exposure of Rs 650 crore to GTL Ltd, Bank of India Rs 467 crore and Canara Bank has Rs 412 crore.
“Various vendor companies were established and operated with the dishonest intention to misappropriate short term bank funds and other credit facilities in collusion with the borrower i.e. GTL Limited,” alleged the FIR.
The company has obtained short term loan amounts for certain business activities by misrepresenting that the entire amount of such loan will be used for the purpose of said purpose. But soon after the disbursement, the majority of the loan amount was not used for the purpose for which it was granted, the CBI said.
Established by Manoj Tirodkar and Global Holding Corporation Pvt Ltd (GHC) in 1987, GTL is dedicated to providing telecom network deployment, operation and maintenance services to telecom operators in India and international markets.
IDBI Bank had conducted a special audit of the company in 2011 and raised the question of a suspicious transaction with the sellers.
The agency’s Economic Crimes Unit found that the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) had warned IDBI Bank on April 1, 2016 to “report” the account and conduct a forensic audit, but in its submitted response two months later, the bank declared on behalf of all consortium lenders not to classify the account as a “red flag” and also not to appoint a forensic auditor as this could delay payment of dues.
The RBI reiterated its directive following which a forensic audit was instituted on July 30, 2016. The company was engaged in the provision of telecommunications network deployment services, professional operation and maintenance services, from network planning and design services and energy management services to telecommunications. operators in India and in international markets.
The CBI has alleged that an amount of Rs 1,213.97 crore (86.84%) is unpaid against four companies – Acuity Trading Pvt Ltd, Lenity Trading Pvt Ltd, Venerate Trading Pvt Ltd and Vinamara Multitrading Pvt Ltd – which received huge material advances from fiscal year 2009-2010 to 2011-2012, but orders for supplies were filled. “Eventually, Rs 1,213.97 crore was left outstanding towards these four suppliers, which were gradually supplied through 2017-18,” the FIR alleged.
The CBI found that advances had been made despite their meager net worth and recent enlistment. “The investigation further revealed that all of these supplier companies were incorporated in less than three months. And the Memorandum of Association (MoA) of these GTL Limited suppliers is exactly the same. There are the same corrections in all MoAs which clearly establishes that all MoAs were authored by the same agency/source,” the FIR alleged.
During the investigation of some of these vendors, entities were examined.
“These administrators had no knowledge of the supply they had made to GTL Limited, source of supply by the supplier companies, progeny of the supplier companies, where the material supplied was located. They also had no knowledge of the work that these supplier companies were using to do,” he says.
The company’s 2016 forensic audit showed that GTL Limited had made substantial progress in procuring equipment from some of the suppliers, although purchases from these parties were much lower.
With agency contributions.
(Edited by : Anouchka Sharma)
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