(Image source from: Act against bank frauds worth Rs 17)

RBI chief Raghuram Rajan has written to the prime minister’s office seeking “concerted” action in the country’s 10 biggest bank frauds allegedly involving prominent real estate, media and diamond firms that are being probed by the CBI, officials told. He has listed the scams pegged at about Rs 17,500 crore and outlined their dates, the reasons cited by banks for delays in their investigation and the status of the cases obtained from the CBI, said sources. “All these high-value frauds have taken place in the last 10-15 years,” said a senior official from the department of financial services (DFS), a finance ministry wing. “Investigations by the CBI are on in the listed cases.”

Analysts say such frauds have triggered a rise in non-performing assets, which stood at Rs 2,60,531 crore for public sector banks till last December. The top 30 defaulters accounted for more than a third of these bad loans. The bank accounts cited by the RBI belong to Winsome Diamond and Jewellery, Zoom Developers, Tiwari Group, Surya Vinayak Industries, Deccan Chronicle Holdings, First Leasing Company of India, Biolor Industries, Surya Pharmaceuticals, Prime Impex / Prime Pulses and a person identified as Shivraj Puri, sources said.

By Premji