As per reports, a court in Port Blair has granted bail to seven individuals implicated in the alleged ₹500 crore fraud at the Andaman & Nicobar State Cooperative Bank Ltd. (ANSCBL).
Those granted bail include: M. Sajid (owner of Andaman Escapades), Tarun Mondal (director of Blair Enterprises Pvt Ltd), Bablu Halder (director of Andaman Mormon Infrastructure Pvt Ltd), Ajay Minz (director of Andaman Treepie Adventure Pvt Ltd), K. Subramanian (former ANSCBL director), and the bank’s former chairman and sitting MP Kuldeep Rai Sharma, as well as ex-MD K. Murugan and bank employee Kalaivanan.
However, Sharma, Kalaivanan and Murugan remain in judicial custody because they have not yet obtained bail in a related case filed by the Enforcement Directorate (ED). Businessman Sanjay Lal is also currently under detention by the ED.
The case began with an FIR lodged on 15 May by the Crime & Economic Offences Cell of the Andaman & Nicobar Police, following a complaint by the deputy registrar of cooperative societies about large-scale loan irregularities at ANSCBL.
ED, which started parallel investigation, suggests that over 100 shell-company accounts were used to sanction more than ₹500 crore in fraudulent loans, of which about ₹230 crore was allegedly siphoned off for Sharma and associates, via cash or shell-company routes in exchange for commissions.
