The Central Bureau of Investigation on Friday arrested two senior retired officers of the Bank of India in connection with an alleged loan fraud worth Rs 2,654 crore.
Officials claimed retired General Manager VV Agnihotri and Deputy General Manager PK Shrivastava granted undue favours to Vadodara-based Diamond Power Infrastructure Limited while granting credit limits, PTI reported. The CBI is expected to produce them in court on Saturday.
The CBI has alleged that Diamond Power Infrastructure Limited, an electrical equipment manufacturing company, and its directors had “fraudulently availed credit facilities from the consortium” of 11 public and private sector banks since 2008, “leaving behind an outstanding debit of Rs 2,654.40 crore as on June 29, 2016”.
When the consortium was formed in 2008, Axis Bank was the lead bank for the term loan and Bank of India for cash credit limits. The agency suspects that Diamond Power had colluded with officials from the banks to get loans and credit facilities even though it was already on the Reserve Bank of India’s list of defaulters and the Export Credit Guarantee Corporation of India’s Caution List.
The CBI arrested the company’s founder and promoter SN Bhatnagar and his two sons, Managing Director Amit Bhatnagar and Joint Managing Director Sumit Bhatnagar, in April.
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