A case was registered at Dadar Police Station on February 15 after alleged misappropriation of funds from the safes of the bank's offices in Prabhadevi and Goregaon came to light following an inspection by RBI
Hitesh Mehta. File pic
A video of Hitesh Mehta, the main accused in the Rs 122-crore New India Cooperative Bank scam case, being questioned by the Reserve Bank of India's (RBI) inspection team and his statement has been obtained by the Mumbai Police's Economic Offences Wing (EOW) as part of its probe, an officer said on Monday.
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According to news agency PTI, the agency will also move an application in court seeking permission to conduct Mehta's lie detector test.
A case was registered at Dadar Police Station on February 15 after alleged misappropriation of funds from the safes of the bank's offices in Prabhadevi and Goregaon came to light following an inspection by the central bank.
The probe was then transferred to EOW, which arrested Mehta, the bank's former general manager (GM) and head of accounts, along with its former Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Abhimanyu Bhoan and real estate developer Dharmesh Paun.
"Mehta was questioned by the RBI team at the bank's Prabhadevi corporate office in the second week of February and his confessional statement about cash going missing from the safe was recorded. The video has been obtained and EOW is going through it as part of the probe," the officer informed.
"Mehta has claimed he had given Rs 50 crore to Unnathan Arunachalam alias Arunbhai who is wanted in the case. As per Mehta, of this amount, Rs 18 crore and Rs 15 crore were deposited in two trusts for profit. We are probing this. We are also probing if Mehta purchased property. The EOW has written to Inspector General of Registration and Stamps, Income Tax department etc," he added.
New India Cooperative Bank scam case: Depositors can withdraw Rs 25,000 from Thursday
PTI, quoting the officer, stated that Mehta has also confessed to have given Rs 1 crore to Bhoan. "We will move an application in the court seeking permission to conduct a lie detector test on Mehta," the officer said, adding that Abhijeet Deshmukh, a partner of the chartered accountancy firm that carried out audits at the bank, is also being questioned by EOW.
"He has produced documents related to the audit of the bank. We are probing why the firm gave A-grade certificate to the bank and did not flag misappropriation of funds underway," the officer said.
Meanwhile, the RBI on Monday relaxed the conditions and permitted the depositors of the bank to withdraw up to Rs 25,000 from their deposit accounts with effect from Thursday, PTI reported.
In a statement, the central bank said that the decision has been taken after reviewing New India Cooperative Bank's liquidity position in consultation with the administrator.
With the relaxation, more than 50 per cent of the total depositors will be able to withdraw their entire balances while the remaining depositors can draw up to Rs 25,000 from their deposit accounts, it said.
On February 13, the Reserve Bank had imposed All Inclusive Directions (AID) on the Mumbai-based cooperative bank, which included a ban on deposit withdrawals, amid supervisory concerns.
Later, the central bank superseded the Board of Directors of New India Cooperative Bank for a period of 12 months.
(With PTI inputs)
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