Bank cheats convicted after 25 years!

Twenty-five years after a bank fraud took place in Bhavnagar, a CBI court in Ahmedabad on Friday convicted ten of 60 accused who are alive. In the Bank of Baroda loan scam case involving Rs60 lakh, other 50 accused are dead.

In 1986, a branch of Bank of Baroda in Bhavnagar sanctioned Rs60 lakh as loans to 38 applicants from fake companies. The manager of the bank, IS Patel, had sanctioned the loans without verifying the documents of the applicants. Patel is no more, so also the main conspirator.

Sources said that the trial of the case was delayed as the case got stuck in a legal tangle. Initially, the CBI had applied charges only under IPC but after trial began, a section of the Prevention of Corruption Act (PCA) was also applied. The case was then transferred from CBI's magistrate  court to CBI's sessions court.

But finally, the trial was conducted under the IPC as the PCA was dropped after the bank manager's death. Special prosecutor RS Meena argued that the accused should be awarded maximum punishment as the nature of the fraud "is very serious". However, all key accused are dead and only applicants are alive.

Special CBI judge VP Patel on Friday pronounced the verdict only in 10 cases. The court sentenced the accused to six months of imprisonment and fined each of them with Rs19,000. According to the CBI case, thebank manager, in connivance with other accused, had hatched a conspiracy and duped the bank. The group had first created fake companies, then  opened bogus bank accounts in other banks, and on the basis of forged documents.