Depositors' Rs1b siphoned off through bank fraud

An alleged financial scam of organised racket with nexus of public and private sector banks has surfaced where two fake/dummy companies were established to siphon off over Rs1 billion depositors' money.

Omni Group has allegedly been involved as its employees having monthly salary of Rs20,000 used to get loans and mark-up amounting to over Rs1 billion and the bank loans defaulted and now siphoned off.

Official documents and background interviews of State Bank of Pakistan and National Accountability Bureau (NAB) high-ups confirmed that they received details about alleged financial scam which exposed vulnerability of whole regulatory regime including oversight role of SBP, Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) and especially NAB as all kind of oversight, rules and regulations of financial sector were breached and simply nexus established among public and private sector banks and then private firm siphoned off loan fraudulently.

Everyone remained silent till the FBR Benami Zone-III

Karachi filed Benami reference against alleged firms and Adjudicating Authority has now shared details with the SBP and NAB high-ups so that they could proceed if any violation was committed in this mega scam under their jurisdiction of respective laws.

First loan was obtained with the claim to provide to Summit Bank for meeting CARs requirements. Then again another Rs810 million loan was obtained on the basis of collateral in shape of land and its valuation was allegedly shown wrongly to the tune of Rs1.4 billion but its actual value was ridiculously low. The documents shared with the SBP and NAB showed that the official record of Sindh Bank showed in 2016 that the Summit Bank was in dire need of injecting equity to meet Capital Adequacy Ratio (CARs) and other requirements of the State Bank.

In May 2, 2016, a meeting of the top management of Sindh Bank and Summit Bank was held at the headquarters of Sindh Bank and in this meeting Sindh Bank consented to extend credit facilities to two customers recommended by Summit Bank to the tune of Rs140 million and with inclusion of mark-up the total outstanding amount stood at Rs178 million.

The credit proceeds were to be utilised for the aforesaid equity injection. This meeting and decisions taken there at however led to an organised bank fraud whereby depositors' money at Sindh Bank was siphoned off through two Benami/dummy companies. This bank fraud can be judged from the simple fact that mutually agreed two creditor concerns were non-existent by 2nd May, 2016 and both were actually incorporated subsequently on 4th July, 2016.

This alleged organised bank fraud kick-started when M/S Parkview Stock & Capital (PVT) Ltd and M/S Seracom Stock & Capital Pvt Ltd, both dummy companies, were incorporated on July 4, 2016. Both these companies' paid-up capital was Rs10,000, divided into 1,000 shares of Rs10 each. The registered office of Park View is situated at Office No.614, 6th Floor, Trade Tower, Abdullah Haroon Road, Karachi, whereas the registered office of M/S Seracom is situated at Office No. 514, 5th Floor, Trade Tower, Abdullah Haroon Road, Karachi. Both offices stand closed for last two years.