Shekhar Reddy case: CBI given 2 days to name bank officials

TIMES OF INDIA 

CHENNAI: Turning its attention to bank officials who had apparently helped sand mining baron J Shekhar Reddy and his associates hoard crores of rupees in new currency notes, a special court for CBI cases has asked the agency to furnish by Friday the names of officials wanted in connection with the fraud. The court also asked why the CBI had not held an inquiry with the Reserve Bank of India(RBI) governor.

Suspecting the involvement of senior bank officials, special judge K Venkatasamy said it was the duty of the CBI to bring the errant bank officials before the court. Since crores of rupees are found in the possession of a few, the involvement of top bank officials cannot be ruled out, the judge said. Demonetisation and the resultant shortage of cur rencies led to a situation wherein crores of people were unable to withdraw or convert their own money. Under such a serious situation, it becomes the duty of the CBI to bring bank officials involved in the racket to the book... The main information that has to be obtained by the CBI is how such a huge quantity of money came into the possession of the accused persons," he said.

Since crores and crores of rupees are found in the possession of a few, the involvement of top bank officials cannot be ruled out, the judge said, adding that so far no bank official has been arrested in the case. There seems to be an attempt to book only the branch manager-level officials for such offences, he said. An order to this effect was given by special judge Venkatasamy on Wednesday when the court sent three suspects - J Sekhar Reddy, M Premkumar and K Srinivasulu - to police custody for two days. They shall be returned to court by Friday, along with the list of names of bank officials who helped them in the deceit. As of now, the CBI has arrested only five persons and none of them is a central government or bank official, despite the fact that the agency has slapped provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act on the accused. In his order, special judge Venkatasamy said government schemes could succeed only if all stake holders and intermediaries such as officials played their role. Following the demonetisation policy, the central bank had been dispatching currency notes to every part of the country, the judge said. "We are witnessing complaints of ATMs not being filled up with currencies, or not properly distributed to the public by bank branches. It is following such complaints that the government had a suspicion as to where the money sent to banks were actually going."

Noting that about 76 people have died so far while waiting to withdraw money, special judge Venkatasamy said that if only the money had been distributed as per the advisories of the Centre and the RBI, such tragedies would not have occurred. Demonetisation policy also would have succeeded without much trouble, he said. "But instead of fairly implementing the policy, some bank officials had indulged in fraudulent transactions and given huge sums to a few people through unfair means.