CBI files RCFL chargesheet
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Tuesday filed first chargesheet in the banking frauds of Anil Ambani’s Reliance Group, without making him as accused. The agency on Tuesday filed a case against five former senior executives of Reliance Commercial Finance Limited (RCFL) for allegedly causing a loss of `4,097 crore to a consortium of 13 public sector banks through diversion of funds, officials said. Two companies, namely Reliance Infrastructure Ltd and Reliance Home Finance Limited (RHFL), have also been named as accused in the chargesheet filed by the agency before a special court in Mumbai, they said.
“Five former senior executives of RCFL, namely Devang Pravin Mody (Director, CEO), Ravindra Somayajula Rao (Director), Dhananjay Bhagwanprasad Tiwari (Director), Rajesh Krishnamoorthy (Executive Risk Officer) and Lav Chaturvedi (Chief Risk Officer), have been chargesheeted for offences of criminal conspiracy and cheating with intent to cause huge losses to public sector banks,” a CBI statement read.
The agency said its investigation showed that the funds borrowed by RCFL were diverted through intermediary and conduit entities to various Reliance ADA Group companies, in violation of the terms and conditions governing such borrowings, thereby causing wrongful loss to the lending banks and corresponding wrongful gain to the accused persons and related entities. “It may be recalled that the CBI had registered the case based on complaints received from Bank of Maharashtra and other PSU banks of the consortium. The total loss caused to 13 public sector banks is Rs 4,097 crore,” the spokesperson said.
The CBI has kept the investigation open into the alleged role of directors, entities and public servants involved in causing wrongful loss to the public sector banks and is likely to file supplementary charge sheets. The agency had earlier arrested former vice chairman of Reliance Capital Ltd, Amitabh Jhunjhunwala, former CEO of RCFL, Devang Pravin Mody, and former CFO of Reliance Capital Ltd Amit Bapna. Jhunjhunwala and Mody are presently in judicial custody, while Bapna is in CBI custody, the spokesperson said. The officials said probe into the role of Jhunjhunwala and Bapna is still going on.
The CBI has registered seven FIRs against Reliance Communications Ltd (RCom), RHFL, RCFL and Reliance Telecom Ltd (RTL) on the basis of complaints received from various public sector banks and the LIC.
