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A special court in Jaipur has sentenced accused Alok Agarwal to seven years of rigorous imprisonment and a ₹5 lakh fine in a long-running bank fraud case investigated by the CBI.
The case dates back to 1997 and involved alleged diversion of nearly ₹5 crore from Vijaya Bank.
Jaipur: A special court in Jaipur has convicted an accused in a decades-old bank fraud case investigated by the Central Bureau of Investigation. The court of the Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate (ACJM) dealing with Special Police Establishment (SPE) cases sentenced accused Alok Agarwal to seven years of rigorous imprisonment (RI) along with a fine of ₹5 lakh.
The verdict was delivered on February 26, bringing closure to a case that has been under investigation and trial for nearly three decades.
According to the Central Bureau of Investigation, the case was originally registered on November 21, 1997, following source information about alleged irregularities involving officials of Vijaya Bank, which has since been merged with Bank of Baroda.
Investigators alleged that certain bank officials and company directors conspired to obtain loan facilities from the bank through fraudulent means. The accused allegedly diverted funds to shell or fake companies without any genuine business transactions.
Authorities said the money was later withdrawn through employees and eventually routed back to the accused persons in cash.
The investigation found that the fraudulent activities resulted in a wrongful gain of ₹4.99 crore to the accused while causing a corresponding loss to the bank.
The scheme reportedly involved the creation of bogus transactions and the misuse of credit facilities granted to a private firm. Investigators concluded that the loan amount was not used for legitimate business purposes but was instead diverted through a network of companies.
After completing its investigation, the Central Bureau of Investigation filed its first charge sheet on September 28, 2001 against accused S. M. Agarwal and Arun Agarwal.
Later, on October 3, 2002, a supplementary charge sheet was submitted against Alok Agarwal, bringing him into the case as an accused. During the course of the trial, one of the accused, S. M. Agarwal, passed away in 2016. As a result, criminal proceedings against him were legally abated by the court.
Following the completion of the trial and examination of evidence, the court held Alok Agarwal guilty and pronounced the sentence of seven years of rigorous imprisonment along with a monetary penalty.
The court also acquitted another accused, Arun Agarwal, citing insufficient evidence against him. The judgment marks the culmination of a long legal process in one of the bank fraud cases investigated by the CBI in Rajasthan.
