PMC Bank: Joy Thomas in police custody till Oct 17

The ousted Managing Director of Punjab and Maharashtra Co-operative (PMC) Bank, Joy Thomas, who was arrested by the Economic Offences Wing (EOW) on Friday in connection with the multi-crore scam in the bank, was remanded in police custody till October 17, on Saturday.

Thomas, who was the MD of the bank till the scam broke out on September 23 and after RBI suspended the bank’s board and imposed restrictions on withdrawals, has been charged with colluding with the

other accused Chairman of the bank, Wayram Singh, HDIL promoters Rakesh and Sarang Wadhwan and other bank employees, by perpetrating a fraud that resulted in a loss of Rs 4,355 crore to the bank.

On Saturday, while seeking Thomas’ custodial interrogation, EOW told the court that Thomas and other functionaries of the bank, including the BoD of the bank and executives, had intentionally reported false records of accounts to RBI to suppress the material position of loan accounts of HDIL’s group of companies.

In its Advances Master Indent (details of loan accounts) in March 2018, submitted to RBI, PMC had replaced 44 loan accounts of HDIL and its affiliates, whose individual balance outstanding were significantly higher, with 21,049 fictitious loan accounts having individual loan outstandings that were comparatively lower. These accounts were not created in the core banking solution of the bank. Rather, those were mere entries in the Advanced Master Indent submitted to RBI for inspection in March 2018.

The camouflage work was done with Thomas’ full knowledge and the bank’s board and executives to hide the loan defaulters at the peril of the bank.