Mumbai: The bankruptcy resolution process<\/a> for Reliance Communications<\/a> (RCom<\/a>) may hit another hurdle with State Bank of India, Union Bank of India and Indian Overseas Bank classifying the accounts of the telco and its units — Reliance Telecom and Reliance Infratel<\/a> — as fraudulent last week, said people with the knowledge of the matter. The lenders are now looking to initiate a deeper probe, said one of the persons.
Resolution applicants Reliance Jio Infocomm<\/a> and UV Asset Reconstruction Co. Ltd (UVARCL<\/a>) may want to seek indemnity from any investigative proceedings into these companies, said the people cited above. Delays will further erode the prospects of recovery for lenders who were expecting Rs 20,000-23,000 crore from the asset sale of RCom and its units. Financial creditors have said they are owed Rs 57,382 crore.
‘May delay recovery process’
<\/strong>
“Lenders will have to make full provisions for their exposure in these accounts over the course of the next four quarters and a decision on whether they want to flag this off with the investigative agencies will also be taken soon,” said a bank executive aware of the development. “The concern among bankers is that if investigators come into the picture, that could delay the recovery process if they consider monies of these firms as proceeds of crime.”
The latest allegations come a year after a forensic audit unearthed questionable transactions worth Rs 5,500 crore in the three Anil Ambani-led Reliance Group<\/a> entities. The probe that looked at transactions between May 2017 and March 2018 found three large entries buried under hundreds of thousands of others that the SBIled consortium suspects could conceal fund diversion, according to the people cited above.
The lenders, RCom, Jio and UVARCL did not respond to ET’s queries.
At the time of filing for bankruptcy, RCom had debt of Rs 46,000 crore. As many as 53 financial creditors, including local and foreign banks, nonbanking finance companies and funds have claimed Rs 57,382 crore, of which Rs 49,224 crore has been accepted by the resolution professional.