Chennai: The CBI on Wednesday conducted a raids on the offices and houses of jewelery chain Kanizhak’s owners in Chennai after complained by the State Bank of India, in which gold house cheated 14 banks of Rs. 824 crore rupees. A CBI spokesman said that the team searched the premises of Bhoopesh Kumar Jain and his wife Neeta Jain and the agency has registered a case. In January, SBI had sought CBI’s help for the investigation of Jewellery chain Kanishk Gold Private Limited for loan fraud of Rs 824 crore. The association has said in its letter that the jeweler had borrowed from banks to increase inventory and borrowed against more than one asset. SBI was the leading bank in 14 consortiums of public and private sector lenders, who gave credit to Kanishka.
In a letter to the CBI on January 25, SBI accused Kanishk of “closing down shops, tampering records”. SBI was the first to declare the fraud to Reserve Bank of India on November 11, 2017. By January, all other banks had declared the accounts as fraud; the SBI said that the jeweler had default the interest payment for eight banks in March 2017 first. That, by April 2017, Kanishk stopped payments to all 14 banks. Bankers were unable to start their stock audit on April 5, 2017 from the promoter. On May 25, 2017, when the bankers visited Kanishk’s corporate office, factory and showroom, they found that they were closed. On the same day, Bhoopesh Jain has written a letter to his bankers that for the duplication of records and the removal of the Stock secured as collateral to the banks. A representative of Madras Jewelers and Diamond Merchants Association said that in May 2017 the firm was closed because “it could not cope with the loss”
