SPECIAL Court of Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate Jyoti Pekhale-Purkar on Friday convicted Sunil Chhatrapal Kedar, Congress MLA from Saoner and former minister along with five others in the infamous Rs 150 crore Nagpur District Central Cooperative Bank (NDCCB) scam cases and awarded five years rigorous imprisonment to them with a fine of Rs 10 lakh each. The judgement, which comes after almost 21 years after the scam came to fore, would be a major embarrassment for the Congress party as its senior leader Kedar is convicted and may lose his membership of the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly with immediate effect. Besides Kedar, the other convicts include Ashok Namdeo Chaudhari (Nagpur), former NDCCB General Manager; Ketan Kantilal Seth (Mumbai), stock broker; Amit Sitapati Verma (Ahmedabad); Subodh Chandadayal Bhandari and Nandkishor Shankarkal Trivedi (both from Mumbai).

 

 

All the six were convicted for the offences under Sections 406, 409, 468, 471, 120-B and 34 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). The court acquitted Suresh Peshkar, the then Chief Accountant of the bank, Mahendra Radheyshyam Agrawal, and Shreeprakash Shantilal Poddar (Kolkata), as the prosecution failed to substantiate the charges against them. In the accused Sanjay Hariram Agrawal’s case, the High Court had granted a stay in the matter. Another accused Kanan Vasant Mewawala was absconding. The verdict in the infamous Rs 150 crore scam case comes more than two decades after it surfaced in 2002 when Kedar was the Chairman of the bank. According to the prosecution, Kedar conspired with other accused and flouted rules while ‘investing’ the bank’s funds in G-secs.

 

The funds were routed through the investment firms Home Trade Securities, Syndicate Management Services, Giltage Management Services, (all from Mumbai), Indramani Merchants Pvt Ltd and Century Dealers Pvt Ltd (both from Kolkata) which neither bought securities nor paid back the money, causing loss to the bank. Subsequently, the bank’s Board of Directors was sacked and an administrator was appointed. An inquiry by the Cooperatives Department had also held Kedar guilty and had asked him to pay up Rs 299 crore (with interest) to the bank. However, the State had failed to recover the money from him. Kedar and others were arrested and later released on bail. Police investigated the case and filed a chargesheet against them. Adv Jyoti Vajani, who was Special Public Prosecutor in the case, had examined 51 of the 53 witnesses.

 

As the charges were proved against Kedar,Chaudhari, Seth, Verma, Bhandari and Trivedi, the special court sentenced them to five years rigorous imprisonment with fine of Rs 10 lakh each for the offence under Sections 409 and 120(b) of the IPC, in default they would undergo additional one year rigorous imprisonment. The court awarded them five more years of rigorous imprisonment with a fine of Rs two lakh each for the offence under Sections 468, 120(b) of the IPC. Similarly, the court sentenced them to one year rigorous imprisonment with a fine of Rs 50,000 for the offence under Sections 471, 120 (b) of the IPC. All the sentences would run concurrently. District Government Pleaders Adv Nitin Telgote (Nagpur) and Adv Ajay Misal (Nashik) represented the State. Adv Devendra Chauhan, Adv Ashok Bhangde and Adv Girish Purohit appeared for Kedar, Choudhary and Seth respectively. Adv Chandrashekar Jaltare and Adv Milind Chaurasia appeared for accused Suresh Peshkar who was acquitted of all the charges. Similarly, Adv Kailash Agrawal represented Mahendra Agrawal and Poddar, who, too, were acquitted.

 

 

The scam was exposed in April 2002. Sunil Kedar, who was the Chairman of Nagpur District Central Cooperative Bank (NDCCB), allegedly in connivance with senior officials of the bank, conspired with directors of intermediary companies to purchase government securities. The NDCCB then gave about Rs 150 crore to the five companies -- Home Trade Securities, Giltage Management, Century Dealers, Syndicate Management and Indramani Merchants -- to purchase the government securities. However, these companies did not return NDCCB with any securities and the accused (now convicted) had embezzled the money. Of these five companies, more than Rs 94 crore went to Home Trade Securities. On May 03, 2002, Kedar was arrested. Later, other 10 accused persons were put behind bars. A chargesheet was filed against 11 accused persons in the court on November 22, 2002. Interestingly, Kedar was granted bail on the ground that the investigation agency did not file the chargesheet within the stipulated time period. Since then, the matter had been lingering for more than two decades.

Recovery Case

 

Kedar moves HC against summons for oral evidence A DAY before the judgement was delivered by the Special Court, Sunil Kedar had approached the Nagpur bench of Bombay High Court challenging the notice by Justice J N Patel Commission directing him to record the oral evidence. The Nagpur Bench of the Bombay High Court had asked Justice Patel, former Chief Justice of the Calcutta High Court to probe into the Rs 150 crore NDCCB scam following a PIL filed by one Omprakash Kamdi for expediting trial in the case, which was lingering for more than two decades. Kamdi had demanded fixation of responsibility for the losses caused to the bank, particularly by Kedar and other directors, besides recovery of dues from them as per the provisions of the Maharashtra Cooperative Societies Act. A division bench of the High Court had allowed the cooperative department way back in 2017 to appoint Subhash Mohod, former principal district and sessions judge, for the probe into the matter . Due to health-related problems, Mohod could not complete the inquiry before the extended deadline of November 6 last year. Subsequently, the High Court had asked Justice Patel to head the inquiry.