KOLKATA: The CBI has registered an FIR against RP Infosystems for defrauding a consortium of 10 banks, including Punjab National Bank, of £51.5 million. The first bank fraud case filed after the scandalous PNB scam, the consortium has claimed that the city-based company, along with its four directors, have committed fraud by availing bank funds on the basis of false and fabricated stock/debtor statements and forged drawing-power letters.
The group of banks includes Canara Bank, Oriental Bank of Commerce, Central Bank, Allahabad Bank, and Federal Bank, among others. Central Bank has a £8.2 million- exposure, Canara has £8.1 million, and PNB has £7.3 million. After Canara registered a formal complaint on February 26 against RP Infosystems, which manufactures and trades in desktops and laptops across India under brand name 'Chirag', CBI sleuths raided several places in Kolkata, Howrah, and North 24 Parganas.
Those named in the preliminary FIR are the company's four directors, including Shivaji Panja, Kaustav Roy, and Vinay Bafna. Panja and Roy were once known to be influential in West Bengal's political circles. When contacted, both Panja and Roy said, “We have cooperated with CBI earlier and will cooperate with them this time too. We do not know much about the new case and are talking to lawyers.”
