Bhansalis Counsel Bids To Implicate Sbi Officials

The defence counsel for C R Bhansali, prime accused in the Rs 1,200 crore CRB scam, yesterday made a strong pitch for the implication of State Bank of India officials in the scam. The counsel presented in court correspondence between the SBI and CRB Capital Markets to hammer home her point.

Defence counsel Indira Bansal said that the SBI had been liberal in granting facilities to the CRB and did not set a ceiling on the amount that could be drawn by the issue of dividend warrants. Bhansali was free to issue dividend warrants upto even Rs 100 crores, she said.

The defence counsel told the court that the SBI had allowed the CRB to open Interest Warrant Accounts despite the fact that Bhansali had not furnished the required documents for the same.

CRBs bankers the Bank of Baroda (BoB), was to confirm that the bankers cheque will be issued in favour of SBI, 3 days before the date of the warrant.

The said format was shown to the Bank of Baroda and they refused to give the said undertaking in the format required by the SBI.

The BoB gave a no-objection certificate saying that they have no objections in their opening these accounts with the SBI as SBI will be able to service their depositors better with its wider branch network, she said.

The defence counsel told the court that the SBI had objected and mentioned that the recommendation format given should be furnished.

The BoB refused to do so and the sanction to open the account was given on June 24, 1996, dispensing with the said format having implication of no undertaking of the banker to prefund the said account, the counsel told the court.

The counsel said that SBI had been informed that in case of overdrawing, the account would be funded either later or immediately.

The counsel said that in March, 1997, the accounts were debited for a large number of warrants. The SBI in March wrote a barrage of letters to the CRB asking them to regularise the account.