The CBI court on Monday took cognisance of the chargesheet filed by the agency in the Punjab National Bank scam and issued non-bailable warrants against Nirav Modi, his brother Neeshal Modi, and Subhash Parab, an executive in Nirav Modi’s group of companies.
The chargesheet names three of Nirav’s firms — Diamond R US, Stellar Diamond, Solar Exports — and senior PNB staffers K.V. Brahmaji Rao and Sanjiv Sharan (both : executive directors), Nehal Ahad, general manager, and Usha Ananthasubramanian, who was then CEO and MD (she is now in a similar position at Allahabad Bank).
The court issued summons to all the arrested accused in the case and posted the matter to June 1.
The charge sheet says the PNB employees abused their positions as public servants and ‘fraudulently and dishonestly’ issued a large number of letter of understanding (LOUs) without any sanctioned limit and without obtaining 100% cash margins . This was in connivance with Nirav Modi, Hemant Bhatt (authorised signatory of many of Nirav’s firms), and Vipul Ambani, a president of Firestar International. The CBI says that from February 2, 2017, to March 23, 2017, Gokulnath Shetty, a now-retired deputy manager of PNB (currently in judicial custody) issued 150 LOUs with due dates from January 25, 2018, to and April 20, 2018, on behalf of the three firms, based on which the firms obtained Buyers Credits from overseas branches of Allahabad Bank, Axis Bank and Bank of India.
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) had issued a circular on August 3, 2016, about cyber-security controls, advising banks to get their SWIFT infrastructure audited and ensure strict vigilance on SWIFT transactions.
These warnings were brought to the notice of Ms. Ananthsubramanian, Mr. Rao, Mr. Sharan and Mr. Ahad.
