New Delhi: The CBI has registered an FIR against media baron Subhash Chandra for allegedly inflating his net worth to avail loans from the Life Insurance Corporation Housing Finance Limited (LICHFL) and then becoming a defaulter, causing a loss of more than Rs 1,322 crore to the public-sector lender, officials said on Saturday.
The LICHFL has alleged in its complaint, which is now part of the FIR, that Chandra submitted net-worth certificates that were used to secure the approval and disbursal of two loans totalling Rs 980 crore.
The LICHFL was one of the lenders that had approached the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT), opposing a recent NCLT repayment plan allowing creditors to recover only about Rs 6.5 crore from Chandra’s personal estate against claims of roughly Rs 22,006 crore.
There was no immediate reaction from the accused named in the FIR.
The complaint concerns a Rs 500-crore facility extended to Vasant Sagar Properties Private Limited, with Pan India Infra Projects Private Limited as the co-borrower, and a Rs 480-crore facility extended to Digital Subscriber Management and Consultancy Services Private Limited, with Spirit Infra Power and Multi Ventures Private Limited as the co-borrower.
According to the complaint, the Rs 500-crore Vasant Sagar facility was sanctioned as a home-entity loan for takeover, top-up and business expansion, and secured by a continuing guarantee dated March 28, 2018, executed by Chandra.
The Rs 480-crore digital facility was sanctioned as a rental-discounting facility under a rental-securitisation scheme through a different loan account, and secured by a continuing guarantee, also executed by Chandra, the FIR alleges.
According to the lender, the net-worth certification submitted by Chandra was issued by DJM and Co. on March 28, 2018, certifying his net worth to be at around Rs 59,000 crore.
The LICHFL has said the digital facility was sanctioned partly on the basis of a net-worth certificate submitted by Chandra, issued by chartered accountants MPJ and Co. on July 6, 2018. The certificate had put his net worth at Rs 40,562 crore.
The two loans subsequently went into default, according to the LICHFL.
The FIR says during the subsequent proceedings under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016, Chandra denied having the net worth stated in the certificates submitted to the LICHFL.
During the proceedings, the noted industrialist pegged his net worth in 2024 to be at Rs 31.79 crore and in 2017-18, at no more than Rs 40,000 crore, the FIR says.
“Subhash Chandra had thus, acting in collusion with the borrowers, Vasant Sagar Properties Pvt. Ltd, Pan India Infraprojects Pvt. Ltd, Digital Subscriber Management and Consultancy Services Pvt. Ltd, and Spirit Infrapower and Multiventures Pvt. Ltd and their officers and directors, defrauded and cheated LICHFL into advancing the loans to the borrower entities, which have since misappropriated the same,” the FIR alleges.
It accuses the former Rajya Sabha MP of creating false documents to denote inflated and false net worth to cheat the LICHFL into deploying funds to the principal borrowers.
“The accused persons breached the trust reposed by LICHFL in misappropriating and misapplying the funds and stripping the assets of the personal guarantor to defeat recoveries by LICHFL,” the FIR alleges.
