SC questions Sahara group over some refund transactions
Supreme Court had earlier asked Sahara group companies to give bank transaction details of Rs 20,000-odd crore which they claimed to have refunded to investors. On August 31, 2012, Sahara Real Estate and Sahara Housing received direction from the Supreme Court to return more than Rs 24,000 crore to investors. The group on Tuesday said they had transferred cash from one company to the other without resorting to banking instruments.
Sebi’s counsel Arvind Datar pointed out about the cash transactions to be unbelievable. He informed that the group furnished no bank statement to substantiate transaction of huge amounts of money.
Datar pointed out that according to transaction details furnished by Sahara India, Sahara Qshop had paid Rs 2,578 crore, in cash, on behalf of Sahara Housing to Sahara India and Sahara Credit Cooperative Society had paid Rs 13,666 crore in cash on behalf of Sahara Real Estate to Sahara India. The amount, as indicated in the records, was refunded to the investors in May-June 2012.
Datar informed that a DVD has been provided by the group, containing data about the companies having returned Rs 29,878 crore to investors. He questioned about the source of additional Rs 4,500 crore. He also questioned about the banking transactions of the group. Money deposits by investors were put in bank but why were banking instruments not used to make refunds, he asked.
SEBI was asked by SC to prepare a flow chart of money transactions as shown in the documents supplied by the Sahara firms. Saleability of the properties provided as security by the Sahara firms to cover the alleged default in refunds will also be examined by SEBI, as directed by SC.
The group has deposited only Rs. 5,120 crore pointing out that their liability was just a little over Rs 2,000 crore and they were keeping the rest as adequate buffer, in case additional claims came up.
Source: The Times of India
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