City cos in bank unions’ defaulters list owe Rs2,500 cr

Nagpur: Over half a dozen companies from Nagpur feature in the list of wilful defaulters in public sector banks, released by the staff union — All India Bank Employees Association (AIBEA). The list shows that the total loans owed by the Nagpur companies come to over Rs2,500 crore, while all the defaulters together owe over Rs1 lakh crore.
The list issued on the occasion of Bank Nationalization Day includes big names like Winsome Diamonds, Gitanjali Gems, Ruchi Soya and Kingfisher Airlines. From Nagpur, the biggest share is of the companies under the Padmesh Gupta headed Gupta Group, at over Rs1,800 crore, followed by the Abhijeet Group, Topworth, Murli Industries, and Rasoya Proteins.
AIBEA has compiled the list into loans worth over Rs5 crore, Rs200 crore and Rs500 crore. The banks that have doled out finances to the companies have also been named in the list. AIBEA sources here said the list is yet to be analysed at the local level. A case-wise comment can only be made after thorough analysis.
Among the companies from Nagpur, Gupta Coal Private Limited owes Rs704 crore and Rs319 crore to Bank of India and Punjab National Bank (PNB) respectively.
These are followed by Jas Infra and Power Limited of Abhijeet Group headed by Manoj Jayaswal, already in the news for bank defaults of over Rs10,000 crore.
Jas Infra had its power project at Banka district in Bihar. According to the list the company has been declared a wilful defaulter for an amount of Rs630 crore from PNB and UCO Bank. Another Abhijeet Group company, Corporate Power Limited, with a loan of Rs200 crore from Allahabad Bank is also in the list.
Varron Aluminum, which features in the list with a loan of over Rs292 crore, has a plant run by its group company Varron Autokast in Nagpur. The loans by other companies are in the range of Rs20 crore to Rs150 crore.
A borrower is classified as a wilful defaulter after due process laid down by the RBI. In such cases, incidents like diversion of loan amount, siphoning of funds or sale of mortgaged assets without bank consent has to be detected.
AIBEA general secretary TS Venkatachalam said even as these borrowers have been declared as wilful defaulters after following the due RBI process, the banks continue to treat them as regular defaulters. He demanded that criminal action should be taken against promoters, and if needed an ordinance should be passed to ensure such action.
Subhash Sawant, a member of Indian National Bank Employees Federation (INBEF), said he had taken out a rally in 2014 on the basis of a similar list put out by his organization — Central Bank of India, demanding action against defaulters. However, he was charge-sheeted by the management and the case continues.
Sawant said simply issuing the list will not be enough and AIBEA should take up the cases vigorously.
TOI could contact a source in Topworth Group among the Nagpur companies. “Our loans ended up in default due to the alleged coal block allocation cases. The coal blocks were withdrawn, after which the banks stopped further funding, leading to the debacle,” said the source requesting anonymity.