Ex-PMC Bank Heads Owned Unaccounted Properties Worth Crores, Depositors Continue To Suffer

Waryam Singh, the former chairman of Punjab and Maharashtra Co-operative (PMC) Bank had amassed huge amounts of wealth over the years, the Economic Offenses Wing (EOW) of the Mumbai Police which is probing the Rs 4,355-crore fraud case has found.

According to the investigators, Singh's property includes a land worth Rs 2,500 crore adjacent to Juhu beach, a five-star hotel in Amritsar and properties in Haryana and Himachal Pradesh. Most of these properties are in the name of one Manmohan Ahuja, who the investigators believe is a frontman of Singh.

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It is not just Singh who has been found to have amassed wealth illegally. Joy Thomas, the arrested ex-PMC Bank MD has also been found of having property worth crores. Investigators said Thomas, a Christian had converted to Islam in 2005 to marry his then personal assistant and took up the name Junaid Khan while he was already married and had another family.

Thomas never revealed this to the bank or anyone else and continued to live a double life. Police have found nine flats registered in the name of Thomas's second wife in Pune. Thomas's first wife has reportedly filed for divorce from the 62-year-old after his double life was revealed.?

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Thomas reportedly sent money to Dubai from PMC Bank through hawala accounts in the name of one Mehta, who then sent the money back to PMC as deposits. More detail about the whereabouts of Mehta including his first name remains unclear.

The duo along with Rakesh Wadhawan, his son Sarang Wadhawan, the two executives of Housing Development Infrastructure Ltd (HDIL) were sent to police custody till October 16.

The FIR states that the bank allegedly replaced 44 loan accounts of HDIL and its group companies with over 21,000 loan accounts to conceal the extent of outstanding balances. The changes were made in documents of loan accounts given to the Reserve Bank of India for the year ended March 31, 2018.