Indiabulls Housing Finance Limited (IHFL) is one of the leading home finance companies in India. Aggrieved shareholders have filed a plea against IHFL, its Chairman and directors for alleged misappropriation of Rs. 98,000 crore of public money in Supreme Court. It was contended in the petition that money worth thousands of crore were drawn away by Sameer Gehlaut, the chairman of the firm and directors for personal use.
Abhay Yadav, one of the shareholder and petitioner was of view that, Gehlaut along with Harish Fabiani- an NRI based in Spain had created multiple “shell company” to which IHFL loaned huge sums of money under “bogus and non-existent pretext.” And those shell companies further transferred the loan amount to other companies which were under control of Gehlaut, or his family members or other directors of Indiabulls.
It was also mentioned in the plea that, “The entire scam would have never been possible without the conniving with the auditors, credit rating agencies and concerned officials of the respective government departments.”
The petitioner also urged to Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), Centre, Reserve Bank of India (RBI), Income Tax Department or the competent authority to direct them for the purpose to restore, protect and conserve the defrauded and misappropriated investors’ money. The point that Gehlaut was rich, influential, powerful person having strong political backing and also he conspired with other directors, and by taking help of political background he could flee to another country along with money of investors must be taken into consideration.
It was also contended that “modus-oprendi” opted by Gehlaut and the alleged co-conspirators to defraud not only the investors at large but also the public exchequer, was multi-dimensional duly buckled-up with manifold layers of criminal and highly unlawful activities.
The only purpose of this financial scam was to collect entire public money and to use it for personal purpose. The amount was taken from shareholders, PSU Banks and Private Banks etc. to make it criminally exclusive and unlawful purposes of Gehlaut and his family members. It is very shocking to hear that Gehlaut and his co-conspirators committed all types of violation relating to financial frauds.
The pleas also contended that, the Gehlaut family was deliberatrly involved in taking kickbacks from his alleged borrowers and mislead the regulating authorities. Also this Gehlaut and Particeps Criminis made so many bogus transactions as well as made fraud in the entries, along with this TDS was also faulted and no timely tax was paid which resulted into loss of more than hundreds of crores of public money.
Further contentions laid down were that, during the establishment of shell companies nearly Rs.1, 700 crore was raised from unknown sources which was illegal as prevented by money laundering act.
Along with the above they have violated SEBI laws, Companies act’s Corporate Governance Policy and guidelines of RBI and NHB. The company officials were the directors, promoters and beneficiaries of interconnected Non-Banking finance companies at Delhi, Mumbai, Gurugram.
Courtesy/By: Renu Kathale
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13 Jun 2019
