In the Rs 150 crore Kotak Mahindra Bank scam, a Panchkula court on Thursday remanded the bank's Deputy Vice-President, Pushpender Singh, to five days' police custody.
Pushpender Singh was the branch manager of Kotak Mahindra Bank, Sector 11, Panchkula, where funds of Municipal Corporation, Panchkula, were siphoned off.
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He had surrendered before the State Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Bureau, Haryana, on Wednesday, and was later arrested. During a hearing in the court, the SV&ACB submitted that Rs 30-35 crore had come in Pushpender Singh’s share, from which "a Wrangler Rubicon, a Mercedes GLS, and a Harley-Davidson motorbike were purchased."
It added that they needed to be recovered from Delhi. It further said that three mobile phones, a laptop, a printer, stamps used to forge FDs, and related documents needed to be recovered from the branch manager, who had kept them in Narkanda, Himachal Pradesh.
"He needs to be interrogated about the whereabouts of the other co-accused and a similar fraud, if any. It is a multi-layered fraud of a complex nature," said the investigating agency.
He is the sixth accused arrested in the case. As per the FIR in the scam, the MC was maintaining 16 FDs, amounting to Rs 145.03 crore, with a maturity value of Rs 158.02 crore, in the bank’s Sector 11 branch in Panchkula. Of the 16 FDs, 11, amounting to Rs 59.58 crore, matured on February 16.
When the MC contacted the bank, officials provided statements that neither matched one another nor the MC’s records, particularly with respect to the FDs. As per earlier submissions of SV&ACB before the court, ex-Senior Accounts Officer of the Municipal Corporation, Panchkula, Vikas Kaushik, allegedly in collusion with Pushpender Singh, fraudulently opened two accounts of the MC, Panchkula, and transferred funds from genuine accounts.
On the account opening form for one account, Kaushik allegedly affixed the official seals of the Commissioner, MC Panchkula, and the Senior Accounts Officer. Furthermore, he and Pushpender Singh forged the signatures of the then Commissioner, MC Panchkula, IAS Sumedha Kataria, and the then Senior Accounts Officer, Sushil Kumar, over these seals.
For the second fraudulent account, Kaushik allegedly signed in the capacity of Senior Accounts Officer and affixed a forged seal of the Deputy Municipal Commissioner (DMC). Over this seal, he and Manager Pushpender Singh also allegedly forged the signature of the then DMC, Deepak Sura.
After allegedly fabricating fraudulent debit notes (RTGS/NEFT notes) purportedly issued by the MC Panchkula, Kaushik would allegedly affix his own signature as one of the signatories, while forging the signature of the second signatory.
Using fraudulent debit notes, Pushpender Singh allegedly transferred funds from these two fraudulent accounts into the accounts of individuals such as Rajat Dahra, Swati Tomar, and others.