PF office drags ICICI Venture in Subhiksha dues case
T E Narasimhan & Raghavendra Kamath / Chennai/Mumbai Mar 18, 2009, 00:16 IST
The Chennai Employees’ Provident Fund Office (EPFO) has written to ICICI Venture, the largest investor in Subhiksha Trading Services, holding it responsible for non-payment of provident fund (PF) dues by the company. The move comes a day after the EPFO attached Subhiksha’s bank accounts for failing to pay the dues.
The EPFO is of the view that ICICI Venture is also liable to pay the dues, as it has the management control of the failed retailer. The EPFO will wait for a response from ICICI Venture before proceeding further.
An ICICI Venture spokesperson said: “We shall be giving an appropriate response to the EPFO intimation.”
The EPFO has supported its stand of holding ICICI Venture also responsible by citing clauses from the shareholder agreement.
Subhiksha’s PF dues amount to Rs 1.76 crore. Managing Director R Subramanian has offered to pay Rs 73.87 lakh from his personal PF account to partly make up for the shortfall. Now, EPFO has pulled ICICI Venture for the remaining dues of Rs 1 crore.
Though Subramanian has in the past claimed that ICICI Venture holds management control in the beleaguered retailer, ICICI Venture, which holds 23 per cent in Subhiksha, has denied this.
According to a senior EPFO official, Subhiksha was given 15 days, starting February 20, to pay the dues. “We will stick to our target of collecting the dues before March 31, 2009, when the fiscal year comes to an end,” the official told Business Standard on Monday.
The Chennai EPFO has also asked PF offices in other parts of the country to check the status of payments by Subhiksha.
good to hear some good efforts have been done by EPFO chennai.But why this situation arose.Is it negligence of pf official who were caught napping all these days or RS was exploiting to loopholes of the pf system by doing some unethical things,which I dont say bribe.Now I request to PF peoples to settle the PF settlement of the employees who ve left and applied for withdrawal.RS has not done anything great by give 73 crores from his personal account.Its only our money which he swindled with.Now what great he has done.Dear Mr RS please I request you to clear the employees salary of Oct and Nov which is long time due, atleast they will pray for you and the company.
We thank the entire media to help us in this case. Both RS as well as ICICI should be penalised for what they have done to thousands of employees. Although ICICI is not guilty for running the show, it was always run in the most absurd manner by RS.
Content Guide
The Chennai Employees’ Provident Fund Office (EPFO) has written to ICICI Venture, the largest investor in Subhiksha Trading Services, holding it responsible for non-payment of provident fund (PF) dues by the company. The move comes a day after the EPFO attached Subhiksha’s bank accounts for failing to pay the dues.
