Sumit Sharma
Early Times Report
JAMMU, Mar 9: A former Union Minister is allegedly pressurising the J&K Bank to waive off the loan it had granted to Bangalore-based liquor baron Viyay Mallya.
In the late 1990s, the bank had granted a loan of Rs 100 crore to Mallya "on the instructions of the former Union Minister who happens to be a friend of the business tycoon." The then chairman of J&K Bank, counted among the beneficiaries of the former Union Minister, had willingly granted the loan to Mallya.
Later, senior PDP leader and former Finance Minister, Tariq Hameed Karra, had expressed grave concern over the shady dealings in J&K Bank and demanded a white paper on the operations of the State's premier financial institution.
The outcry prompted the bank to sell shares it was holding and belonged to Mallya's United Spirits Holdings and Kingfisher Airlines.
It recovered about Rs 70 crore from the sale of shares. The share sale began in end-2012. Shares were sold in small segments over 2-3 months.
At the moment, Rs 30 crore is still outstanding against Mallya, sources told Early Times.
Now, they said, the former Union Minister, is putting pressure on J&K Bank to "forget this Rs 30 cr outstanding."
Notably, besides J&K Bank, Mallya owes thousands of crores to State Bank of India, Bank of India, Bank of Baroda, Central Bank of India, Corporation Bank, Axis Bank, Federal Bank, Indian Overseas Bank, Punjab National Bank, Punjab and Sindh Bank, UCO Bank, United Bank of India, IDBI and the State Bank of Mysore.
Led by State Bank of India, the 14-bank consortium, which has an exposure of about Rs 7,000 crore, has also started the recovery process by partly selling the pledged shares of United Spirits two weeks back. The consortium has so far sold Rs 7.3 lakh shares of the total 26 lakh shares pledged.
United Breweries, promoter to the cash-strapped airline, had moved the court to stop the sale of United Spirits shares by the consortium, claiming that the the sale could hamper the USL-Diageo deal and harm shareholder interest. However, the court refused to stop the share sale. The consortium was represented by law firm Dua Associates, while UB was represented by Bachubhai Munim & Co. |
