CBI arrests Syndicate Bank CMD

The CBI Saturday arrested S.K. Jain, chairman and managing director (CMD) of state-owned Syndicate Bank along with five others for allegedly taking a bribe of Rs.50 lakh, an official said.

Jain was arrested in Bangalore following charges of demanding a bribe to extend credit facilities of some companies, an official of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) said here.

The CBI has registered two cases against Jain and 11 other private people, including the CMD and directors of two Delhi-based private firms - Bhushan Steel Ltd. and Prakash Industries - on charges of criminal conspiracy and under the Prevention of Corruption Act.

Bhushan Steel vice chairman Neeraj Singhal along with Prakash Industries CMD Ved Prakash Agarwal and director Vipul Agarwal have been named in the case.

The other names are Pawan Bansal, Vineet Godha and Punit Godha, Vijay Pahuja, Pursotam Lal Totlani and Pankaj Bansal.

"It is alleged that S.K. Jain has been indulging in negotiations for illegal gratification directly as well as through middlemen for extending undue favour to private companies by granting sanction to various financial proposals," an official said.

The official further said the private people, on behalf of companies, allegedly entered into criminal conspiracy and obtained illegal gratification meant for Jain and further delivered it to the middlemen.

"It is further alleged that Jain was directly negotiating with a private company in one of the cases for an illegal gratification of Rs.50 lakh in lieu of granting credit extension to the company as it had defaulted on the payment of loan instalments amounting to crores of rupees to the Syndicate Bank," said the official.

"The company official later agreed to pay the gratification and the money was transferred to the middlemen who are also relatives of Jain," said the official.

The CBI laid a trap and recovered the illegal gratification of Rs. 50 lakh on the spot after the delivery was made.

"So far, several asset papers and incriminating documents have been found. An amount of Rs.21 lakh along with a fixed deposit of Rs.63 lakh and gold worth Rs.1.68 crore have been recovered from S.K. Jain," the official said.

Raids were conducted simultaneously at 20 places across Delhi, Bangalore, Bhopal and Mumbai, the official added.