CBI arrests GM rank officer of PNB, 5 senior officials of Nirav Modi & Mehul Choksi’s firms
The arrested include the former manager of PNB’s Brady House branch, Rajesh Jindal (Picture: PTI)
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) arrested a general manager rank officer of the Punjab National Bank (PNB) and five senior officials working for the companies of diamond trader Nirav Modi and his uncle Mehul Choksi.
The arrests were made in connection with the PNB scam, for which the bank has lodged two financial fraud complaints of Rs. 11,400 crore and Rs 280 crore against Nirav Modi, his family members and Mehul Choksi, owner of Gitanjali Gems.
The functionaries employed by Nirav and Mehul’s companies were arrested after questioning on Tuesday.
The arrested individuals include Vipul Ambani, President, Finance Firestar International, Kavita Mankikar, Executive Assistant and Authorised Signatory and Arjun Patil, Senior Executive, Firestar group, a CBI official confirmed.
They were all employed with Nirav Modi’s company.
Related: Nirav Modi not absconding, out of India for business purpose: Lawyer
The CBI further arrested Kapil Khandelwal, Chief Financial Officer, Nakshatra and Gitanjali groups and Niten Shahi, Manager, Gitanjali group – both belonging to the group led by Choksi.
The agency also placed Rajesh Jindal, who was the head of the Brady House branch in Mumbai during 2009-2011, under arrest yesterday night.
It is alleged that the issuance of Letters of Undertaking (LoU) to Nirav Modi group firms without sanctioned limits started during his tenure. Jindal is presently posted as GM, Credit, PNB Head Office, New Delhi.
The series of events started unfolding after PNB detected a 1.77 billion dollar scam, in which jeweller Nirav Modi acquired fraudulent letters of undertaking from one of its branches for overseas credit from other Indian lenders.
The scam started in 2011 and was detected in the third week of January this year, after which the PNB officials reported it to the concerned agencies.
