Vipul Ambani, Kavita Mankikar and senior officials of Nirav Modi firm arrested by CBI in PNB fraud case

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Tuesday made fresh arrests in connection with Punjab National Bank (PNB) fraud involving billionaire diamond merchant Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi.

State-owned PNB has been rocked by the fraud involving Nirav Modi who allegedly acquired fraudulent Letters of Undertaking (LoUs) from a branch in Mumbai to secure overseas credit from other Indian lenders.

Those arrested by the agency on Tuesday includes Vipul Ambani (President, Finance, the Firestar International/diamonds group), Kavita Mankikar (Executive assistant and Authorised Signatory of 3 accused firms) and Arjun Patil (Sr. Executive, Firestar group)

Among those arrested in relation to Mehul Choksi firms are Nakshatra group and Gitanjali group CFO Kapil Khandelwal, and Gitanjali group manager Niten Shahi.

On Monday, the agency arrested Chief Manager (Forex department) Bechhu Tiwari, Manager Yashwant Joshi and Export officer Praful Sawant who have been sent to police custody till 3 March. Whereas, last week, the CBI arrested Gokulnath Shetty (retired DGM of PNB), bank's Single Window Operator Manoj Kharat and Hemant Bhat, the authorised signatory of the Nirav Modi Group of Firms.

Earlier in the day, the Income Tax Department raided 20 premises Mehul Choksi and associated firms. Raids were conducted in Mumbai, Pune, Surat, Hyderabad, Bengaluru and few other cities against 13 companies linked to Choksi and the Gitanjali Gems.

Meanwhile, breaking his silence over the PNB fraud, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said the state will chase down whosoever cheats the banking system.

Without naming Punjab National Bank or the alleged kingpin of the scam Nirav Modi, Jaitley said bank management did not live up to their task as it failed to detect the delinquent.

He went on to blame auditors for being unable to detect irregularities and asked supervisory agencies to assess the system requirement to detect such frauds.

Nirav Modi has virtually wrung his arms in the air, saying PNB's overzealousness has shut the doors on his ability to clear the dues.

In a letter Modi wrote on February 15/16 to the PNB management, he pegged the amount his companies owes to the bank under Rs 5,000 crore.

"In the anxiety to recover your dues immediately, despite my offer (on February 13, a day before the public announcement, and on 15,) your actions have destroyed my brand and the business and have now restricted your ability to recover all the dues leaving a trail of unpaid debts,"he said.

Nirav Modi his relative Mehul Choski, and others are being investigated by multiple probe agencies after it recently came to light, following a complaint by the Punjab National Bank, that they allegedly cheated the nationalised bank to the tune of Rs 11,400 crore, with the purported involvement of a few employees of the bank.

The Central Bureau of Investigation and the Enforcement Directorate have registered two FIRs each to probe the case. One on January 31 and another a few days ago -- against billionaire diamond merchant Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi and others for allegedly defrauding the PNB of about Rs 11,400 crore.