YES Bank founder Rana Kapoor has been booked by CBI for allegedly obtaining Rs 307 crore bribe in the purchase of a Lutyen’s zone bungalow from a realty firm to go easy on around Rs 1,900 crore bank loans to the seller’s group companies.

The case pertains to  1.2-acre uber-luxe bungalow at 40, Amrita Shergill Marg which the Avantha group had mortgaged to ICICI Bank and DCB bank at Rs 550 crore, of which Rs 380 crore was outstanding in March, 2016, the officials said.

The investigative agency has alleged that Yes Bank chipped in with a loan of Rs 400 crore as Lease Rental Discounting (LRD) in which discounted values of future lease rentals proposed to be received by borrower by leasing its property are sanctioned as a loan amount.

The  CBI has also booked Kapoor’s wife Bindu, her company Bliss Abode Pvt Ltd as well as Avantha Realty Ltd and Gautam Thapar the promoter of Avantha Group, which sold the bungalow, the agency officials said.

According to the officials, on Friday, the CBI carried out searches at the residence of Kapoor, former MD and CEO of Yes Bank and his wife Bindu in Mumbai, and offices of Bliss Abode Pvt Ltd, Thapar and Avantha group companies and Indiabulls Housing Finance Ltd in New Delhi and NCR, they said.

Indiabulls Housing Finance, however denied that any raid of the CBI has happened on Indiabulls group or at any of its offices.

“CBI raids have happened on Yes Bank/Rana Kapoor who have their offices in Indiabulls Finance Centre in the capacity of a tenant,” In a statement the company secretary of Indiabulls Amit Jain said.

Meanwhile, the CBI officials maintained that searches took place at Indiabulls Housing Finance Ltd office in New Delhi.

In order to justify the higher loan amount, Avantha Realty (ARL) allegedly entered in sham lease agreement with a group company, BILT Graphics Paper Pvt Ltd, at a whopping Rs 65 crore per annum with five per cent yearly escalation, they said.

The agreement was executed on March 22, 2016, two days prior to sanction of the loan from Yes Bank to ARL. Surprisingly, the same property was leased to another Avantha group company for Rs 1.02 crore per annum before, officials said.

“It was essentially a sham agreement entered into with an intention to defraud and cheat Yes Bank Ltd for justifying loan of Rs 400 crore to ARL for the purpose of acquiring the property by Bindu Kapoor who was a director in Bliss Abode Pvt Ltd,” the CBI FIR alleged.

The agency has alleged that at the time of sanctioning the loan, the outstanding liabilities of Avantha group were a staggering Rs 1,333 crore towards Yes Bank which had extended credit facilities of Rs 2,500 crore to it. The company was not eligible for the loan, they said. Avantha group used the Rs 400 crore loan to clear loans of ICICI Bank and DCB, following which the charge of the property, which commanded a valuation of Rs 550 crore, was created in favour of Yes Bank, the FIR said.

For the first year, principal loan repayment was kept at Rs 5 lakh per month which was 100 times lower than the rental income the property was projected to fetch, the CBI FIR alleged, adding it was done to keep the account standard as ARL would have found it difficult to service the loan.

A year later, the account came under stress with principal liabilities of Rs 12 crore and unpaid interest but not enough to justify sale of the collateral — the bungalow. But, a decision to sell the property against the loan was taken, the FIR alleged.

A noted company showed interest to buy the property at Rs 375 crore for which ARL sought a non-objection certificate from the bank which was given on the condition that the entire loan will be repaid, the CBI said.

This offer was allegedly withdrawn on August 29, 2017, and Bliss Abode pitched in to purchase the property at Rs 378 crore which was readily agreed by a Management Credit Committee (MCC) headed by Kapoor and a no-objection certificate (NOC) was issued, they said.

Bliss Abode mortgaged the property to Indiabulls Housing Finance Limited for a total loan of Rs 685 crore loan — Rs 375 crore obtained in two deals of Rs 90 crore and Rs 285 crore, and Rs 310 crore of further loans to Imagine Estate Pvt Ltd and Imagine Home Pvt Ltd, both having Bindu as director, they said.

The loan of Rs 90 crore by Bliss Abode, in which Rana Kapoor was a co-borrower, from Indiabulls Housing Finance Ltd in July 2017, on a property in charge with Yes Bank, and other details were not disclosed by him to the Yes Bank board and the MCC which was allegedly in conflict of interest, violation of bank’s code of conduct and certain provisions of the Companies Act, 2013.

“This appears to have been done with an ulterior motive to acquire the property as illegal gratification for various favours extended by Rana Kapoor to AG companies,” the FIR alleged. Instead of seeking sale of other properties, he gave further loans of Rs 1,165 crore to its group companies under stress.

“These loans are yet to be repaid to Yes Bank Limited and there is stated to be a total outstanding of Rs 1900 crore against various credit facilities extended by YBL to AG companies by January, 2020,” it said.

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) placed the bank under a moratorium and imposed limits on withdrawals.

YES Bank  had tried unsuccessfully for months to raise the capital it needs to stay above regulatory requirements. The RBI and SBI came to the rescue of Yes Bank. Last week, the RBI took control of Ye Bank and said it would work on a revival plan while the SBI on Saturday said it would invest funds to buy a 49 per cent stake in Yes Bank as part of initial phase of a rescue deal.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman last week had said that Yes Bank had granted loans to entities including bankrupt Dewan Housing and Finance Ltd.

The agency is primarily investigating Rana Kapoor, his wife, and three daughters in the case over a Rs 600 crore fund received by a firm which is allegedly controlled by the accused from an entity linked to scam-hit Dewan Housing Finance Limited (DHFL).

The Rana Kapoor-linked firm, DoIT Urban Ventures (India) Pvt Ltd, is alleged to have received the funds when Yes Bank had an exposure of more than Rs 3,000 crore loans to DHFL, already being probed for purported financial irregularities and diversion of funds.

The bank, they said, allegedly did not initiate action to recover the NPA-turned loans from DHFL and the agency suspects that the Rs 600 crore funds were part of alleged kickbacks received as quid pro quo in the firm controlled by the Kapoor family.

Meanwhile, the Union Finance Ministry on Friday notified the reconstruction scheme for crisis-hit YES Bank and said that moratorium on the bank will be lifted within three working days and a new board, having at least two directors of SBI, will take over within seven days of the issuance of notification.

Government issued Gazette notification following approval by the Union Cabinet of RBI’s “YES Bank Limited Reconstruction Scheme, 2020”.

(With PTI inputs)