Mumbai: The Mumbai police plan to seek the help of former auditors in the National Bank for Rural Development (NABARD) in their present probe into the multi-crore Maharashtra State Coperative (MSC) bank scam.
A senior EOW official told FPJ on Thursday the auditors had brought to light the alleged financial malpractices going on in the bank between 2007 and 2011 in their report, submitted in 2015.
The audit report, which had nailed politicians and former chairman and managing directors of the bank in the scam, constituted the core of activist Surinder Arora’s complaint which was later converted into a Public Interest Litigation (PIL).
The official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the auditors, many of whom have retired from service, are being contacted at present. “They will help us guide through the methodology they had adopted in their audit,” he said.
Moreover, the EOW has also sought fresh copies of the audit report from the NABARD. “We have already written to the bank to give us copies of the original report,” the official added.
Apart from seeking help from the NABARD auditors, the EOW is in the process of hiring a professional auditing agency to assist in the scrutiny of the volumnous documents of the MSC bank and its subsidiaries, spread across 34 districts in the state.
“We are in the process of putting up advertisements, inviting auditors. The agency would be chosen through competitive bidding,” the official added.
In addition, the EOW has also started seeking various files and reports pertaining to the sanctioning of loans and recovery of those from the MSC bank.
“Documents pertaining to the loans extended against pledge, hypothication or collateral guarantee have been sought, along with the entries concerning payment and default papers,” sources added.
Last month, the Mumbai police had registered an FIR at the MRA Marg police station to investigate the alleged Rs25,000 crore scam on the direction of the High Court.
The investigation was later handed over to the EOW, which had formed a Special Investigation Team (SIT) under a Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) for supervison of the probe.
By Debasish Panigrahi
