Dena Bank expects the forensic investigations report on its Malabar Hill branch scam to be available in the next ten days, its Chairman and Managing Director Ashwani Kumar has said.
Professional services firm Deloitte is looking into the matter post the Finance Ministry’s directive that forensic investigations be carried out on the scam, Kumar said.
“We came to know (of this scam) in the first week of July and that is why the first part of provision was made in the April-June quarter itself. We are hopeful of recovery”, Kumar told Business Line .
The scam would this fiscal blow a ₹ 217 crore hole in the bank’s profit and loss account with the top management deciding to provide for the entire outstanding overdraft of ₹ 217 crore.
At the request of the bank, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) had as a special case recently allowed Dena Bank to amortise the provisioning requirements for this fraud (Malabar Hill branch in Mumbai) equally over four quarters during 2014-15.
With a sum of ₹ 54.29 crore already provided in the just ended April-June quarter, the balance (₹ 162.8 crore) will be provided equally in subsequent three quarters, Dena Bank said in a recent filing to the stock exchanges.
This was a reiteration of the point number 6 in the ‘Notes to Accounts’ forming part of the first quarter unaudited results released on August 9.
Kumar said that the bank could have opted for treating the misappropriated amount (estimated at ₹ 217 crore) as contingent liability, but decided otherwise.
“We are making a provision only. On recovery, this could be written back”, Kumar noted.
The scale of provisioning involved - arising from the fraud—was significant given that the money misappropriated was equivalent to almost forty per cent of the net profit of ₹ 538 crore reported by the bank in 2013-14.
“This level of provisioning and that too arising from one branch is too vulgar for any comfort”, said a banking industry observer.
There is a need for greater scrutiny on the source of funds and whether due diligence was done on the depositor, it was felt.
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) is already looking into the matter after Dena bank lodged a complaint with them.
SCAM EXPLAINED
The Malabar Hill branch of Dena Bank had received bulk term deposits from various entities/government organisations between January 30, 2014 and May 5, 2014.
Subsequently, term deposits amounting to ₹ 256.69 crore were pledged to the bank by the same signatories to obtain overdraft facilities of ₹ 223.25 crore (present outstanding ₹ 217.17 crore).
The funds were surreptitiously transferred out of the bank by creating fake overdraft facility, resulting in fraud on the bank and the concerned entities/government organisations.
The erring branch manager has been suspended and also the branch staff have been transferred, according to Dena Bank’s filing with the stock exchanges.
srivats.kr@thehindu.co.in