Gitanjali group owner Mehul Choksi and Allahabad Bank CEO Usha Ananthasubramanian, who was subsequently divested of all powers, along with 13 others have been charged for alleged cheating and corruption in the issuance of fraudulent letters of undertakings (LoUs) worth £708.08 million from Punjab National Bank (PNB) in the country's biggest banking scam case. Also accused by the CBI are Mehul Choksi's three companies, Gitanjai Gems Ltd, Gili India Ltd, and Nakshatra Brands Ltd.
The chargesheet pertains to a second FIR related to alleged crimes of Choksi and his companies in the series of three such cases registered by the CBI in the over $2 billion scam case in which jeweller’s nephew Nirav Modi is also an accused, they said. The agency had filed a chargesheet on May 14 in a related case against diamond merchant Modi pertaining to alleged swindling of £ 649.82 million using fraudulent LoUs issued from PNB's Brady House branch in Mumbai. The total figure of swindled funds by the two men now stands at £1.36 billion from PNB by using fraudulent LoUs, officials said.
Choksi and his companies allegedly availed credit from overseas branches of Indian banks using the fraudulent LoUs and letters of credit issued Brady House branch in Mumbai which were not repaid bringing the liability on the state run bank, officials said. The chargesheet, filed in the Mumbai special court after a three-and-a-month-long probe, alleged that deputy manager in PNB, Gokulnath Shetty, arrested by the CBI, received £100,000 from the companies of Choksi to issue LoUs to his companies. This quid pro quo pertains specifically to alleged illicit payments made by Choksi's companies. Officials said the probe into the overall picture to establish the total amount allegedly received from companies of Modi and Choksi is still underway.
CBI spokesperson Abhishek Dayal said, “Investigation revealed that, during the period from 2015 to 2017, the accused officials of the Punjab National Bank, in criminal conspiracy with the said managing director and others had fraudulently issued a large number of LoUs for obtaining Buyers' Credit and FLCs to overseas banks in favour of the said three companies without any sanctioned limit or cash margin and without making entries in the CBS system of the Bank.”
Usha Ananthasubramanian, who was the MD and CEO of PNB during 2015-17, the bank's sitting executive directors--K V Brahmaji Rao and Sanjiv Sharan, and general manager (international operations) Nehal Ahad have also been chargesheeted for criminal conspiracy, cheating and provisions of prevention of corruption act. among others.
