The forensic auditors appointed by the Supreme Court, to investigate the accounts of Amrapali Group, have said that there could be a web of more than 200-250 companies, to which the money taken from home buyers was transferred
The court was also told that there may be a case of the Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA), as large amount of money was transferred to a multi-national company based in Mauritius.
A bench of Justices Arun Mishra and UU Lalit said, money of innocent buyers could not be misused like this and asked the Mauritius-based JP Morgan Company to file its account statement, with regard to the transaction with the Amrapali Group. The counsel for JP Morgan said they had invested more than Rs 100 crores in the real estate business of Amrapali Group and they had a claim of Rs 168 crores from the reality firm.
At the outset, forensic auditors Pawan Kumar Agarwal and Ravi Bhatia said, besides the 47 sister companies declared by the Amrapali Group, they have initially found 23 companies and now another eight companies, with which the reality firm had transactions. “We have no iota of doubt that not only the promoters, the chief financial officer (CFO) and the internal auditors of the Amrapali Group were also part of the syndicate. Prima facie, we have found the relatives of promoters, CFO and internal auditors were directors in these companies, where the money was transferred,” Agarwal said. “Initially, we found 23 companies, where transactions had taken place and now we have found eight more companies. We anticipate that there are more than 200-250 such companies, where the money was transferred but their names have not been disclosed by the Amrapali Group till now.”
The bench directed the Group to disclose the passwords of these computers given to the forensic auditors, within three days and mark which computer belonged to which company. “We understand everything what is happening. We are not saying anything at present but waiting for the proofs and disclosure of details. They may hide the information for say seven days but on the eighth day we will have the information, no matter what,” the bench said.
The bench also asked the Amrapali Group to disclose the details of luxury cars owned by the company and their registration numbers; after the forensic auditors flagged that a luxury car was given to the CFO. “It appears that they were not only in construction business but into something else also,” the bench said and questioned the CFO, about the benefits he took from the Amrapali Group. It also asked the CFO to disclose, by November 1, 2018, the details of the companies he had incorporated, the home buyers’ money which was transferred to these companies, on whose authorisation the funds were transferred and the benefits he took from the Amrapali Group. The court warned that any wrong information found at a later stage, would lead to consequences and he may be sent behind bars.
Courtesy/By: Shubham Mathur
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06 Nov 2018
