Yes Bank: CBI files fresh case against Rana Kapoor, wife
New Delhi: As the conspiracy behind the Yes Bank crisis continues to unfold, the CBI has registered a fresh case against erstwhile MD Rana Kapoor and his wife Bindu Rana Kapoor, days after it booked the couple in a separate FIR with respect to DHFL, in a case where Kapoor as the head of Yes Bank had allegedly extended loans of around Rs 1,565 crore to Avantha Group of Companies promoted by Gautam Thapar, in exchange for a posh bungalow in New Delhi's Amrita Shergill Marg at throwaway prices. When these loans were sanctioned, Avantha Group companies already had bad loans of around Rs 1,976 crore with Yes Bank, in addition to having borrowed a total of around Rs 2,500 crore from the private lender.
Officials here said that agency sleuths started raiding residential and official premises of the couple in Mumbai on Friday along with the offices of Bliss Abode Pvt Ltd - where Bindu is one of two directors, Avantha Realty Ltd and Indiabulls Housing Finance Ltd in the Capital in connection with the case.
According to the central probe agency, the approximately 1.2-acre property at 40, Amrita Shergill Marg was acquired from Avantha Reality by Kapoor for a price of around Rs 378 crore through Bliss Abode, where his wife is a director. The CBI has alleged that the bungalow was practically given away at a much less amount than its value to purportedly look the other way with respect to Avantha Group's massive dues with the bank and sanction fresh loans of over Rs 1,000 crore.
One property against seven loans
The criminal conspiracy in the case as alleged by CBI is convoluted and calculated. According to details made public by the agency, the bungalow at Amrita Shergill Marg was mortgaged by several group companies of the Avantha Group in exchange for availing seven different loans from Indiabulls Housing Finance Limited, Yes Bank and ICICI Bank between 2016 and 2018.
The property, initially owned by Avantha Reality Ltd (ARL), was first mortgaged with ICICI Bank and Development Credit Bank (DCB) by Avantha Holding Limited (AHL) in March 2016 against which AHL availed credit facilities of Rs 380 crore. In the same month, ARL mortgaged the property with Yes Bank in exchange for a Rs 400 crore loan under a Lease Rental Discounting agreement.
As per such an agreement, the borrower mortgages a property expected to earn rent in exchange for credit facilities. As per the agreement, ARL had decided to charge a rent of Rs 65 crore/year from BILT Graphics Paper Pvt Ltd (BGPPL) (another Avantha group company) and the Management Credit Committee - headed by Kapoor - had sanctioned the loan amount just two days after BILT and ARL executed their agreement.
But interestingly, just before leasing the bungalow to BGPPL, ARL was leasing the property to another of its group companies at just Rs 1.02 crore/year. Moreover, the CBI has alleged that the entire Rs 400 crore loan from Yes Bank was used to settle AHL's dues with ICICI Bank and DCB.
After Bindu's Bliss Abode purchased the bungalow and mortgaged it with Indiabulls Housing Finance Limited (IHFL), against which three more loans totalling around Rs 685 crore were availed by Bliss Abode and two other companies related to Bindu.
Ultimately, after Bliss Abode purchased the property, two group companies of Avantha Group further mortgaged the bungalow with Yes Bank once again to avail credit facilities of Rs 1,165 crore comprising two loans - a Rs 515 crore availed by Oyster Buildwell Pvt Ltd and Rs 650 crore availed by Solaris Chemtech Industries Limited - both group companies of Avantha Group.
The bribe
CBI officials here said that the acquisition of the lavish bungalow in the heart of Lutyens' Delhi was part of a quid-pro-quo deal between Rana Kapoor and Gautam Thapar of Avantha Group because of the extremely nominal rates that it was sold to Bliss Abode.
In fact, the agency has said that the Rs 378 crore offer from Bindu's Bliss Abode was just Rs 3 crore higher than an earlier offer, which investigators now believe was made to veil the transaction. Moreover, the CBI's case alleged that the property was sold by Yes Bank at a time when the outstanding principal amount of the borrower did not call for such a sale.
After the sale was triggered by Yes Bank, the management decided to entrust this to ARL itself, which received an offer from InterGlobe Enterprises Limited even before its accounts had turned NPA. Accordingly, ARL applied for a No Objection Certificate was granted by Yes Bank but the offer was withdrawn for "unexplained reasons and immediately thereafter" within two days, an offer of Rs 378 crore came from Bliss Abode.
Furthermore, what caught the eye of the agency was that Bliss Abode had mortgaged the bungalow for loans from Indiabulls even before presenting an offer letter to purchase the property.
And as far as the value for which it was acquired, several previous valuations of the bungalow show that it was valued at above Rs 500 crore. Because of the fact that the bungalow was mortgaged so many times - ICICI Bank had first valued it at Rs 550 crore and then eventually brought it down to Rs 500 crore.
The CBI has said that up to January 2020, the outstanding amount owed by group companies of the Avantha Group to Yes Bank stands at around Rs 1,900 crore.
