Jewellers association had forewarned Raghuram
IBJA says even PC was warned of a scam
In a dramatic twist in the ongoing PNB-Nirav Modi scam tale, it has now been revealed that the Indian Bullion and Jewellers Association had forewarned the RBI governor of the time — Raghuram Rajan — of an epic swindle in the works as far back as July 26, 2014.
According to IBJA president Mohit Kamboj, “Finance minister P. Chidambaram ostensibly brought the 20:80 gold policy at that time to control the burgeoning current account deficit which had shot into the stratosphere due to rampant gold import. In this policy the jewellers had to export 20 per cent of the gold that they got from banks. In reality, this was done by the finance minister to benefit a handful of cronies going under the nomenclature of Star Trading Houses and Premier Trading Houses (which included both Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi groups) since scarce gold was sold at a mark up of approximately 10 to 15 per cent per kg.”
“We made several representations not just to the RBI governor but to finance ministry mandarins including P. Chidambaram himself but all to no avail. It is only in July 2014 after the NDA government had come to power was cognisance taken of the clutch of continuing representations and FM Arun Jaitley acted and clamped down in November on this dubious and even suspicious scheme,” he claimed.
In his capacity as IBJA president, he wrote to RBI governor Raghuram Rajan on July 26, 2014 accusing the UPA government of “deliberately yielding to the cronies” by changing the gold policy days before demitting office. A decision was taken on May 21, 2014, five days before the UPA government officially demitted office, which allowed 13 ‘Star Trading Houses (STH)’ and ‘Premier Trading Houses (PTH)’ including Choksi-led Gitanjali Gems to import gold and sell about 80 per cent of their total bullion shipment in local markets under the so-called 80:20 scheme.
IBJA said that the RBI circular on May 21, 2014 had “sidestepped nationalised banks, which have been the backbone support of our bullion importing and jewellery exporting members, by allowing certain private sector export houses to import gold up to two tonnes at one time, even for those who are not in the business of bullion and gold jewellery”. Further, the association also asked Dr Rajan to “make a prudent appraisal” of the decision and “check the loopholes before it was too late.”