Eight week time for Baripada UCB to pay back depositors

CUTTACK: Hopes of depositors in the Baripada Urban Cooperative Bank (BUCB) to get back their money has gone up with the Orissa High Court directing the liquidator to disburse it within eight weeks. The order paves the way for return of Rs  68.78 crore to over 72,000 depositors. The Registrar of Cooperative Societies was appointed as liquidator after the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) cancelled the bank’s licence in October 2014. 

The Court issued the direction after State Counsel Bibhu Prasad Tripathy in pursuance of an order issued earlier submitted an affidavit indicating the data on depositors, amount to be refunded to them and whether the bank had enough money for the purpose.

In the affidavit, Deputy Registrar Cooperative Societies Damayanti Singh said the bank had disbursed Rs  3,46,00,202 to 233 depositors and another Rs  68,78,21,776 is to be disbursed to the remaining depositors. Singh added that the bank has sufficient funds (Rs  82, 59, 15,822 kept in other nationalised and state cooperative banks) for disbursement to all the depositors.

The division bench of Justice Sanju Panda and Justice SK Panigrahi modified the order issued by a single judge bench on June 25 and directed the liquidator to disburse the money of the depositors within eight weeks. 

Set up on April 24, 1960, BUCB was operating in Baripada with three branches at Udala, Karanjia and Rairangpur in the district. RBI had granted licence to BUCB on October 21, 2009.