Dr B Thomas (Special correspondent)
Branch manager of a nationalized bank is among the three booked for misusing a Fixed Deposit account of customer to generate overdrafts worth Rs.5.7 crore and transferred it to around 30 bank accounts in West Bengal and parts of the state within seven days in May this year .
The fraud came to light when the senior officials stumbled upon the sudden spurts of overdrafts and initiated the probe.
Based on the complaint by DS Murthy,Zonal manager of Indian Bank,the Hanumantha Nagar police charged the branch manager,Assistant manager and clerk,under cheating and forgery on Friday.
Mr. Murthy in his complaint said that one of the customer having an account in the bank with a balance of Rs.1.3 crore and borrowed a loan of Rs.75 lakh on that account .
As per the procedure the bank had put a lean mark on the account ( If you deposited an FD as security for a loan then after that that you will be unable to withdraw any amount from the FD as the bank will be putting a lock or marking that FD amount as a lien amount).
However the accused branch manager and his Assistant and a clerk,misusing the power removed the lean mark and generated overdrafts basing the FD account as surety and transferred the Rs.5.7 crore to 30 different bank accounts of West Bengal and Karnataka Region.
The police have initiated probe and verifying the documents to track down the beneficiaries accounts and their link to the accused.
