CBI books Madhya Pradesh CM Kamal Nath's nephew Ratul Puri in Rs 354-crore bank fraud case

The CBI has booked Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Kamal Nath's nephew Ratul Puri, the then former executive director of Moser Baer, and others in connection with a Rs-354 crore bank fraud case filed by Central Bank of India, officials said on Sunday. Besides Ratul and the company, his father and Managing Director Deepak Puri, Directors Nita Puri (Ratul's mother and Kamal Nath's sister), Sanjay Jain and Vineet Sharma have also been booked by the agency for alleged criminal conspiracy, cheating, forgery and corruption.

Ratul had resigned from the post of executive director in 2012, while his parents continue to be on the board, the bank said in a statement.

The agency has carried out searches at six locations including the residences and offices of the accused directors Sunday, they said. The company is involved in the manufacture of optical storage media like compact discs, DVDs, solid state storage devices.

The case has been registered based on a complaint from Central Bank of India. The company was taking loans from various banks since 2009 and went for debt restructuring a number of times, the bank has alleged in the complaint which is now part of the CBI FIR.

When it was unable to pay the debt, a forensic audit was done and the account was declared as "fraud" by the Central Bank of India on April 20, 2019, it has alleged.

"...The MBIL has committed fraud and cheated the complainant bank thereby making a wrongful gain to themselves and a wrongful loss to the lender bank which is a custodian of public money," the complaint to the CBI said.

Primary security of the bank consisting of stock of finished goods. semi finished goods and raw material have also been dishonestly and fraudulently removed by the company and its directors in order to prevent the distribution amongst the creditor banks to satisfy the debt, the bank has alleged.

"The funds granted by the banks have been misused and misappropriated by MBIL and its directors for their own personal use, MBIL and its Directors and promoters have also committed fraud in respect of reporting book debts, which were also one of the primary securities of the bank," it said.

The bank claimed that the company and its directors forged and fabricated documents to induce Central Bank of India to release funds, it said.

"MBIL has cause unlawful loss to our bank to the tune of Rs 354.51 crore as on November 29, 2014 and interest thereon by getting unlawful gains," the complaint said. 

(With PTI inputs)