Former BJP MLA’s son arrested

MUMBAI: Former Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MLA Sardar Tara Singh’s son Rajneet Singh has been arrested in the ₹4,355-crore PMC Bank fraud case. This takes the total number of arrests in the case to nine. The accused Rajneet Singh is one of the 12 directors on the PMC Bank board.

Joint commissioner of police, Economic Offences Wing, Rajvardhan Sinha, confirmed the development.

Singh, who was picked up from his Bhandup home, was in the recovery committee of the bank and was aware of the bad status of all the loan accounts of Housing Development Infrastructure Limited (HDIL), Sinha added.

Singh will be produced in a holiday court on Sunday. He is likely to face charges of deliberately overlooking irregularities and wilful omission.

In another development, ED officials informed the court on Saturday that they would need two more days to file their response on the EOW’s application seeking permission to auction perishable properties of HDIL and the Wadhwans. The court gave the ED two more days, according to an EOW officer.

Also, the RBI administrator of the bank informed the court that they would auction the moveable assets of HDIL/Wadhwans under the SARFAESI Act, apart from immovable properties.

Earlier, HDIL promoters Rakesh Wadhwan and Sarang Wadhwan, former managing director Joy Thomas, former chairman Waryam Singh, ex-director Surjit Singh Arora and three auditors were arrested in the case. Thomas, Singh and Arora are accused of unlawfully availing loans for HDIL group .

So far, 10 deaths related to the PMC Bank crisis have been reported in Mumbai.