PMC Bank scam: Police custody of 3 accused extended till Oct 16

PTI, Oct 14, 2019, 3:52 PM IST

Mumbai: A Mumbai court on Monday extended till October 16 the police custody of two top officials of HDIL and Punjab and Maharashtra Cooperative (PMC) Bank’s former chairman in connection with the multi-crore scam at the bank.

Terming it as a case of “white collar terrorism”, hundreds of depositors protested outside the court, demanding that their money be returned at the earliest and strict action be taken against the accused.

The three accused – Housing Development Infrastructure Ltd’s (HDIL) chairman and managing director Rakesh Wadhawan, his son Sarang Wadhawan and PMC Bank’s former chairman Waryam Singh – were produced before a metropolitan magistrate on Monday as their police custody ended.

Mumbai Police’s Economic Offences Wing (EOW), which is probing the case, sought further custody of them.

Magistrate S G Shaikh, after perusing the remand application filed by the police, extended the three accused’s police custody till October 16.

The Wadhawans were arrested on October 3, while Singh was held on October 5 for their alleged involvement in the Rs 4,355 crore scam at the PMC Bank.

Hundreds of the bank’s depositors, holding placards, gathered outside the court premises in south Mumbai and staged a protest, demanding that their “hard-earned” money be returned at the earliest.

The placards read: “No bail, only jail”, “Vote for NOTA”, and so on.

Some of the depositors, while speaking to the media, sought a written assurance from the prime minister and finance minister that their money would be returned.

The EOW earlier this month registered a case against the Wadhawans and top officials of PMC Bank for allegedly causing losses to the tune of Rs 4,355.43 crore to the bank.

Besides these three accused, the EOW also arrested the bank’s former managing director Joy Thomas, whose police custody will expire on October 17.

The EOW earlier told the court that bank officials replaced 44 loan accounts of HDIL with 21,049 fictitious accounts, to camouflage huge loan defaults by the real estate group which landed the bank in the current crisis.