Gujarat High Court seeks probe info from CBI in DPIL Rs 2,654-crore fraud case

The Gujarat High Court on Thursday directed the investigating officer (IO) probing the Rs 2,654 crore bank fraud case involving Bhatnagar brothers— Amit and Sumit Bhatnagar, of Diamond Power Infrastructure Limited (DPIL) — to provide the updated details of the probe carried out so far.

The court's direction came in response to the bail pleas filed by the duo in which final hearing is going on.

According to senior advocate Yatin Oza, who appeared for the Bhatnagar brothers, the court wants a report from the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) which is the probe agency in the case, regarding the investigation carried out in the case so far.

"The court has ordered the CBI to submit the progress report of further investigation on January 8," Oza told DNA.

Earlier, the court had directed the CBI to provide details of the backlog of cases in the special CBI court, which has been already provided to the court.

While the CBI had vehemently opposed the bail plea of the duo in the court, the petitioners advocate sought bail on the ground that chargesheet had been already filed in the case.

Oza had contended before the court that the various properties of the accused had been already put up before the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT). He had submitted that NCLT has already appointed a resolution professional to deal with the properties, to sell them, and use the funds for repayment to the banks.

Notably, the Bhatnagar brothers had moved the high court after their bail plea was rejected by a special CBI court in May. CBI had registered a criminal case in March 2018 against the Bhatnagar brothers and their father Suresh, all promoters of DPIL, for fraudulently availing credit facilities from a consortium of 11 banks since 2008, leaving behind an outstanding debt of Rs 2654.40 crore as on June 29, 2016.

CBI had further alleged that the company and its directors managed to get loans and credit facilities despite the fact that they were already featuring in the Reserve Bank of India's defaulters' list and ECGC caution list at the time of initial sanction of credit limits by the consortium.