RBI imposes penalty of Rs 1 crore on Union Bank of India

This action is based on deficiencies in regulatory compliance and is not intended to pronounce upon the validity of any transaction or agreement entered into by the bank with its customers, says RBI

The Reserve Bank of India on Monday imposed a monetary penalty of Rs 1 crore on state-owned Union Bank of India for deficiencies in regulatory compliance. The penalty was imposed by an order dated November 25 for non-compliance with the certain provisions of directions issued by the RBI contained in Reserve Bank of India (Fraud - Classification and Reporting by commercial banks and select FIs) Directions 2016 and Guidelines on Sale of Stressed Assets by Banks.

The banking regulator, in a statement, said, "This action is based on the deficiencies in regulatory compliance and is not intended to pronounce upon the validity of any transaction or agreement entered into by the bank with its customers."

Giving details, the RBI in a statement said the statutory inspection for supervisory evaluation (ISE) of the bank was conducted by it with reference to its financial position as of March 31, 2019.

Examination of the risk assessment report, inspection report and all the related correspondences revealed, inter alia, non-compliance with certain directions to the extent of failure to classify an account as a Red Flag Account despite the presence of early warning signals and failure to disclose ageing of and provisioning for security receipts (SRs) in its annual report, the RBI said.

The central bank, however, added that the penalty is based on the deficiencies in regulatory compliance and is not intended to pronounce upon the validity of any transaction or agreement entered into by the bank with its customers.

A notice was issued to the bank advising it to show cause as to why penalty should not be imposed on it for non-compliance with the RBI directions, RBI added.

"After considering the bank’s reply to the notice, oral submissions made during the personal hearing and additional submissions made by the bank, RBI came to the conclusion that the charge of non-compliance with the aforesaid RBI directions was substantiated and warranted imposition of monetary penalty on the bank, to the extent of non-compliance with the aforesaid directions," RBI further said.

Last week, RBI imposed a monetary penalty of Rs 1 crore on the State Bank of India (SBI) for contravention of a provision in the Banking Regulation (BR) Act, 1949, relating to the extent of shares a Bank can hold in borrower companies.