A Delhi court has sent Avantha Group founder Gautam Thapar to a day's ED (Enforcement Directorate) remand as it will continue hearing arguments by the investigating agency which has claimed a loss of Rs. 466 crores to Yes Bank. Being represented by a team from Karanjawala and Co., Gautam Thapar has been allowed to meet his lawyers Sandeep Kapur and Vijay Aggarwal for half an hour while in ED's custody, 15 minutes of which are to be privileged and confidential. While ED sought Gautam Thapar's custodial remand to get details of allegedly sham transactions, Thapar's counsel opposed the request while maintaining that he was already cooperating in the investigation.
While the court noted that it needed time to go through the case files, ED sought Gautam Thapar's custodial remand to get details of the alleged sham transactions. Appearing for Gautam Thapar, lawyer Vijay Aggarwal submitted that money had been raised by mortgaging valuable shares of CG Power with the Aditya Birla Group and Edelweiss Bank. Claiming no wrongful gains to Thapar, Aggarwal argued that the agreements were created by Yes Bank itself and contended that not even an FIR was filed on this issue by the ED.
The court deferred the hearing as it wanted time to examine the FIR and other case files, while it asked Thapar's counsel to explain the basic purpose behind taking a loan. ED submitted that while Thapar had appeared for questioning, he didn't give proper replies. ED had claimed that Thapar couldn't explain why a loan was obtained.
Yesterday, ED raided offices and the residence of the accused Gautam Thapar and arrested him on charges of criminal breach of trust, cheating, criminal conspiracy, forgery, diversion and misappropriation of public money from 2017 to 2019. Thapar, Avantha Realty and Oyster Buildwell have been accused of causing a loss of Rs. 466.51 crores to Yes Bank.
The court also refused to issue a notice to the CBI (Central Bureau of Investigation) in a pending case without seeing all files. In June this year, CBI had filed a case alleging breach of trust, cheating, criminal conspiracy and forgery by Avantha Group founder Gautam Thapar, Oyster Buildwell Private Limited (OBPL) and various others; which allegedly caused a loss of Rs. 466.15 crores to Yes Bank. CBI had recovered incriminating documents and digital evidence during the searches conducted at 14 locations in Delhi/NCR, Lucknow, Secunderabad and Kolkata; including residences of the accused.
Yes Bank's complaint had claimed that a subsidiary of OBPL was given a long-term loan of Rs. 515 crores for a period of 10 years in December 2017, for an operations and maintenance (O&M) contract of a 600 MW power plant. However, the company started defaulting on repayment which led to declaration of the loan account as an non-performing asset (NPA) on 30 October 2019, and further as a "Red Flagged Account" on 6 March 2020 on the basis of Early Warning Signals (EWS).
With total outstanding principal dues at Rs. 466.15 crore, the bank's forensic audit revealed that only Rs. 14.16 crore of the total disbursed loan was transferred for the destination of its sanction, while whereabouts of over Rs. 500 crores couldn't be determined. After an internal review of documents, Yes Bank discovered that the sanctioned loan was used to clear outstanding dues of Gautam Thapar-led Avantha Group.
In 2020, CBI had booked Yes Bank's ex-MD Rana Kapoor and family in a fraud case where he was accused of taking Rs. 307 crores as bribe by buying a bungalow from Avantha Realty. In lieu of this transaction, Rana allegedly went easy on loans taken by Thapar's companies where public money was purportedly diverted from 2017 to 2019.
Subscribe To ET Now For Latest Updates On Stocks, Business, Trading | ► [ Ссылка ]
Subscribe Now To Our Network Channels :-
Times Now : [ Ссылка ]
The NewsHour Debate : [ Ссылка ]
To Stay Updated Download the Times Now App :-
Android Google Play : [ Ссылка ]
Apple App Store : [ Ссылка ]
Social Media Links :-
Twitter - [ Ссылка ]
Facebook - [ Ссылка ]
G+ - [ Ссылка ]
Website - www.etnownews.com
