The bank officials arrested in the D.S. Kulkarni group fraud case “sanctioned credit illegally and misused their positions of authority” and “colluded” with the group, in flagrant violation of Reserve Bank of India (RBI) guidelines, said Sudhir Hiremath, deputy commissioner of police (DCP), EOW.
“We are probing them further to determine the extent of this conspiracy,” said Mr. Hiremath. He said that without obtaining the sanction of other banks in a consortium formed to advance credit for D.S. Kulkarni’s ‘Dream City’ project, the Bank of Maharashtra (BoM) officials disbursed ₹50 crore. Mr. Hiremath said the BoM authorities did not recall loans given to Mr. Kulkarni even though they were aware of the parlous state of the DSK group’s finances in 2016. BoM’s MD & CEO Ravindra Marathe and Rajendra Gupta, Executive Director (BoM), along with Sunil Ghatpande, DSK’s chartered accountant and Rajeev Newaskar, vice-president, Engineering Department, DSK Developers Ltd (DSKDL), were later produced before a special court where they were remanded in police custody till June 27. Nityanand Deshpande, Zonal Manager, BoM and its former Chairman and Managing Director Sushil Muhnot who were arrested outside Pune, are to be produced in court on Thursday, police sources said.
The BoM in a statement on Wednesday said, “The bank’s total outstanding exposure to M/s D.S. Kulkarni Developers is to the tune of ₹94.52 crore which is fully secured by primary and collateral securities.” It said loans were as per norms.