A magistrate court in the city on Friday rejected the bail applications of Dewan Housing Finance Limited’s (DHFL) promoters Kapil Wadhawan and Dheeraj Wadhawan in the CBI’s case against them in connection with Yes Bank fraud.
The bail pleas had been filed on merits of the case. The Wadhawans had been booked by the CBI in a case of defrauding Yes Bank to the tune of Rs. 3,700 crore. At the exact same time, the duo are also facing a case in the specific Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) court registered against them by the Enforcement Directorate in the exact same case.
In August final year, the Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate court had rejected the duo’s ‘default bail’ pleas sought in the present case. It had been filed on the grounds that the chargesheet was not filed inside stipulated time. The court had then stated that “mere delay in sending documents from registry of special judge CBI and delay on part of the clerk to keep it before this court for cognizance, it cannot be said that chargesheet is not filed”. Thereafter, in November, the Bombay High Court had denied them default bail pleas which they had claimed stating that procedural specifications have been not followed prior to filing the chargesheet and therefore they have been entitled to default bail.
Also charged by the CBI in the case are Yes Bank’s founder and former MD and CEO Rana Kapoor and his daughter Roshini Kapoor.
It is the CBI’s case that in a criminal conspiracy hatched by the accused, Yes Bank had invested Rs. 3,700 crore in DHFL in brief-term debentures for which the Wadhawans had paid a kickback of Rs. 600 crore to Rana Kapoor in the kind of a builder loan to a firm owned by his daughter Roshini. The loan was sanctioned with substandard collateral of meagre worth. DHFL has not redeemed the quantity of Rs. 3,700 crore.