Chennai: Car loan of Rs 6.71 crore vanishes into thin air

Chennai: CBI investigators are probing a case of a fraud by a bank manager, in which he had sanctioned a total loan of Rs 6.71 crore for as many 61 brand new sedans, hatchbacks and SUVs, which were never delivered.

Based on a complaint from a DGM of Syndicate bank, Chennai, CBI registered an FIR against the suspended manager of the bank’s Teynampet branch and three others, including a used car dealer, for siphoning off the money and causing a loss to the tune of Rs 6.71 crore to the bank.

According to the FIR filed on Monday, 61 vehicle loans were sanctioned by V. Rajendran, the suspended bank official, to purported purchasers of cars through one BM Cars. Of the 61 cars, 48 cars were never delivered, 13 were not hypothecated to the bank. The loans were sanctioned from September 2015 to July 2016.

CBI believes that the loss to the bank was caused cheating by way of diversion of funds through act of criminal misconduct including forgery, breach of trust and abuse of official position for wrongful gain.

When the senior bank officials scrutinised the borrowers list, it was found that those were doing small time jobs, living in modest houses in narrow lanes where four wheelers cannot even enter. The list of cars the borrowers ‘purchased’ included Ford Ecosport, Honda  city, Hyundai Verna, Volkswagen Polo, Skoda Rapid and Mahindra Scorpio.  

 Most of the car loans sanctioned were for high end cars, which the borrowers are not eligible for, in term of their income. All borrowers were new customers and half of them are not even traceable.

The required income documents were fabricated by the car dealer and agents in collusion with the branch manager and the loan amount was released to BM Cars.