CBI books bank officers, GTIL in Rs 4,000-crore loan fraud case

New Delhi, Aug 22 (PTI) The CBI has conducted searches at the office of GTL Infrastructure Ltd (GTIL) in Mumbai after registering an FIR against it and unidentified officials of banks in a loan-fraud case of more than Rs 4,000 crore, officials said on Tuesday.

The officials of 13 banks are under the agency’s scanner for allegedly assigning Rs 3,224 crore dues of the company to an asset reconstruction firm for Rs 1,867 crore without attempting to secure their loans from collateral securities, they said.

They were part of the negotiations related to the outstanding loans of GTIL, the officials said.

The banks are Union Bank of India, Central Bank of India, Indian Overseas Bank, Bank of Baroda, ICICI Bank, Punjab National Bank, Oriental Bank of Commerce, Andhra Bank, Bank of India, axis Bank, State Bank of India, United Bank of India and Dena Bank, they said.

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) registered the case after a preliminary inquiry in which it surfaced that GTIL, promoted by Manoj Tirodkar, was engaged in the “business of passive telecom infrastructure sites capable of hosting multiple service providers”, according to the FIR.

The officials said the searches were conducted at the company’s office in Navi Mumbai recently.