The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has attached assets worth ₹100 crore of a businessman and his family members for allegedly cheating the IDBI Bank by fraudulently taking Kisan Credit Card (KCC) loans.
The accused has been identified as Rebba Satyanarayana. The properties attached by the agency include agricultural lands, fish ponds, commercial sites, plots and flats in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, besides bank balances.
The ED’s money laundering probe is based on a First Information Report registered by the Central Bureau of Investigation against Satyanarayana and others for allegedly taking KCC fish tank loans to the tune of ₹112.41 crore in the name of “benami” borrowers.
According to the agency, the accused conspired with bank officials and others to get the loans sanctioned in the name of his family members, relatives and acquaintances. The funds were first transferred to the borrowers’ savings accounts opened by him and then, most of the amount was withdrawn in cash and handed over to him.
Satyanarayana used the money for repayment of earlier loans taken by the entities controlled by him; purchasing properties in various names; and making investments in other export-import businesses, as alleged. The properties bought by him in the name of his relatives and others were again mortgaged for getting other loans.
“He is a habitual offender who is taking cyclical loans to repay old loans and divert portions of the sanctioned loans to run his various ‘benami’ ventures,” said the agency, adding that he had incorporated an entity in New Jersey, United States, and exported sea food/cultured prawns worth over $24,00,000 from his domestic company to the overseas one, which is pending for export realisation. This issue is also being probed.
