Assets of HDIL promoters may be auctioned

Police’s economic offences wing (EOW) plans to sell private properties of Rakesh Kumar and Sarang Wadhawan, promoters of Housing Development and Infrastructure Limited

Police’s economic offences wing (EOW) plans to sell private properties of Rakesh Kumar and Sarang Wadhawan, promoters of Housing Development and Infrastructure Limited (HDIL), to recover money for depositors of the fraud-hit Punjab and Maharashtra Co-operative (PMC) Bank. So far, the EOW and the Enforcement Directorate have seized as part of their investigation assets amounting to more than Rs 3,830 crore. During interrogation, the Wadhawans have said they have no objection to their private properties being sold in order to repay the illegal loans that are part of the Rs 4,355-crore fraud at PMC Bank.

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“We are planning to sell some private properties of the Wadhwans under section 102 (which allows police officers to seize any property which may be alleged or suspected to have been found under circumstances which create suspicion of the commission of any offence) of Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC),” said a senior police officer.

These properties include two aircraft – a Bombardier Challenger 300 VT and a Falcon 2000 VT –owned by Privilege Airways Private Limited (linked to HDIL); an 88-foot long Ferretti 881 HT yacht owned by Sapphire Land Development Private Ltd (part of the HDIL group); and 10 luxury cars including a Rolls Royce, Bentley, Range Rover and Audi.

“By auctioning these properties of the Wadhawans, we plan to give some instant relief to the bank and its depositors. Presently these properties are under the ED’s possession. They would be auctioned after taking a no-objection certificate from the ED,” said the police officer.

HDIL is accused of unlawfully availing loans of thousands of crores from PMC Bank, in connivance with senior management of the bank. The EOW’s special investigation team searched the homes of four former directors of PMC Bank, including that of Surjit Singh Arora, who was arrested on October 16. Police sources said some documents were seized during the searches and three more former directors may have deliberately overlooked irregularities in process to facilitate the loans granted to HDIL. These directors were the part of the bank’s loan committee, improvement committee and recovery committee.

So far, five people have been arrested in the PMC Bank case. Aside from the Wadhawans and Arora, Joy Thomas and Waryam Singh, who were the former managing director and chairperson of PMC Bank respectively, are also in custody.