Months after being scammed by Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi, the PNB suggested that there were several loopholes in the monitoring operations at its Brady House Branch in Mumbai, where bank manager Gokulnath Shetty helped clear 13,000 transactions each amounting above Rs 1 crore.
The amount involved in the transactions approved by Shetty is way above his authorized limit. Shetty has been blamed of side-stepping SOPs or Standard Operating Procedures. The report, prepared by a four-member team of PNB executives, also suggested that Shetty was given unlimited powers to clear transactions, even though he was just authorized to approve transactions between Rs 10 lakh and Rs 25 lakh.
The report also suggests that during his seven-year stint at the bank, Shetty had approved 13,501 transactions of Rs one crore or more, raising doubts on how he managed to breach the bankās guidelines. It was also highlighted that in 2017, he was also the āmaker and checker of entriesā. It goes on to suggest that the fraud could have been stopped if daily monitoring reports would have been checked by his colleagues.
Further, the report showed that a junior rank official was given complete control to access that bankās software and subsequently verify transactions without the fear of getting detected. It may be noted that that the intervention of senior executives in the entire process could have helped detect the unauthorized transactions long back; however, no such step was taken.
Besides, the investigation also showed that when Shetty was on leave, his SWIFT password was accessed by the Brady House Branch to authorize payments to international banks. According to the probe report, Shetty enjoyed the patronage of senior officials at the bank and despite being transferred thrice from Brady House Branch, he was never relieved.
He was issued a transfer request after the end of a three-year tenure on April 1, 2013, but he continued to serve. Then again on July 1, he was transferred to PNB House Branch. He has again issued a transfer order in the next five months, but he decided not to move. In 2015, a third transfer order was issued against his name, asking him to over to Opera House Branch in Mumbai but just two days later an order was passed to retain him at Brady House Branch. In all of the abovementioned cases, the circle office issued an order and changed it but without offering any justification.
Apart from Shetty, former MD Usha Usha Ananthasubramanian and two former executives, KV Brahmaji Rao and Sanjiv Sharan, have also been named in the CBI chargesheet. Meanwhile, the Indian government has also stepped up its efforts to bring Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi back to the country but there has been no concrete information on their whereabouts till date. There have been several reports indicating that Nirav Modi is fleeing from one country to another but there has been no official confirmation on the same.
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