ED initiates probe against Anil Ambani over ‘bank fraud’

ED claims the “fraud” has caused a loss of over Rs 2,929 crore to the State Bank of India.

Anil Ambani

After receiving documents of a case registered by the CBI, the ED on Wednesday initiated an investigation against industrialist Anil Ambani in connection with an alleged bank fraud. ED claims the “fraud” has caused a loss of over Rs 2,929 crore to the State Bank of India.

“On August 21, the CBI filed a criminal case against M/s Reliance Communication Ltd (RCOM), Mumbai, its Director Anil D Ambani, unknown public servants and unknown others on the allegations of defrauding the bank, and thereby causing wrongful loss of `2,929.05 crore to the bank,” an official said.

An ECIR – the ED’s equivalent for a police FIR – has recently been filed, taking cognisance of a CBI complaint on August 21.

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Earlier, a spokesperson for Anil Ambani had said the industrialist had been “selectively singled out” and “strongly denies all allegations and charges”.

After registering a case, the CBI had obtained the search warrants from a Mumbai court and conducted searches at Anil’s residence and premises of Reliance Communications. “The accused in the latest ED case are the same as in the CBI FIR and the money-laundering investigation has been enlarged to look into all aspects of the alleged fraud linked to the Anil Ambani group companies and any possible inter-connection of these cases,” a source said.

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