ABG Shipyard: CBI to summon officials for questioning

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) will soon summon the promoters of ABG Shipyard Ltd for questioning in connection with the case filed against them on grounds of alleged criminal conspiracy, cheating and corruption involving sizeable borrowings from a consortium of banks.

Sources said the CBI would soon summon ABG Shipyard’s former chairman and managing director Rishi Kamlesh Agarwal, former executive director Santhanam Muthaswamy and directors Ashwini Kumar, Sushil Kumar Agarwal and Ravi Vimal Nevatia to appear before it for questioning in what is claimed to be the largest bank fraud case in India involving a sum of Rs 22,842 crore.

Several incriminating documents, such as books of accounts of the accused borrower company, purchase and sales details, minutes of meetings of the board, share registers, various contract files, etc were recovered which are being scrutinised. Also, bank account details of the accused as well as related parties have been obtained. The accused have been located in India. Subsequently, Look Out Circulars (LOCs) against the accused have already been opened by CBI, the probe agency said in a statement. It further added that the withdrawal of General Consent to CBI Investigation by certain states has made the registration of bank fraud cases more challenging. There are around 100 high value bank fraud cases that could not be registered due to non-accordance of specific consent under section 6 of DSPE Act by state governments where the general consent has been withdrawn.

The CBI had filed a case on February 7 after a complaint by the State Bank of India (SBI), which is among the 28 banks and financial institutions whose total outstanding dues stand at Rs 22,842 crore. Of this amount, Rs 7,089 crore is due to ICICI Bank, Rs 3,639 crore to IDBI Bank, Rs 2,925 crore to State Bank, Rs 1,614 crore to Bank of Baroda, and Rs 1,244 crore to Punjab National Bank, among others. SBI had filed its complaint with the agency on November 8, 2019.

The CBI has already conducted searches at 13 locations of the accused including office and other premises of the company and its directors at Surat, Bharuch, Mumbai and Pune among others. The agency said that it has recovered incriminating documents during the search.

ABG Shipyard has constructed over 165 vessels, including 46 for export market) in the last 16 vears including specialised vessels like newsprint carriers, self-discharging and loading bulk cement carriers, floating cranes.