The CBI told the court that it suspects the involvement of more PNB officials, and diamond trader Nirav Modi, who is at the centre of the scam, fled the country before the bank could lodge a complaint.
Also, it has yet to unearth the larger conspiracy, exact magnitude of the scam, identity/roles of other accused and the end-use of the public funds diverted in the scam, the agency said.
"Remand report (application filed by the CBI) shows that there is a fraud of Rs 280 crore which may rise to Rs 6,000 crore," the court said.
The CBI today arrested Gokulnath Shetty, then deputy manager (now retired) of PNB; Manoj Kharat, a single window operator of PNB, and Hemant Bhat, authorised signatory of Nirav Modi, the billionaire diamond merchant.
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"No documents or applications for issue of fraudulent LOUs issued by Shetty are available at PNB office," it said.
Preliminary investigation revealed that Shetty, in connivance with accused companies, had issued fraudulent SWIFT massages without any authority, which were not entered in the trade finance module of the CBS (Core Banking System) to avoid detection, the Central agency said.
"From the internal investigation reports of PNB, it is revealed that the logs in the SWIFT were used by many officials including Shetty by using passwords in the capacity of maker/verifier/authorizer enabling the fraudulent SWIFT messages," the remand report read.
Kharat was Shetty's subordinate and acted upon his directions in making and verifying Swift messages before Shetty authorised and transmitted them during 2017, the CBI told the court.
"Kharat admits that this was happening regularly and many other officers have done this before. But he is not revealing their names," the agency said.
Bhat was Modi's authorised signatory. He and one Kavita Mankikar were authorised to sign account opening forms on behalf of Modi's firms, the CBI said.
It has yet to recover some important documents related to fraudulent LOUs, the CBI added, seeking custody of the three accused for the maximum possible period.
It has yet to unearth the larger conspiracy, exact magnitude of the scam, identity/roles of other accused and the end-use of the public funds diverted in the scam, it said.
On January 31, the CBI registered an FIR against Nirav Modi, his companies and his uncle Mehul Choski.
Shetty, Kharat and Bhat were arrested in connection with the same case, the CBI said today.
The FIR has listed eight fraudulent transactions worth over Rs 280 crore but based on further complaints from the bank the CBI now says the amount investigated in the first FIR is over Rs 6,498 crore, involving 150 Letters of Understanding allegedly fraudulently issued by Shetty and Kharat.
All these LOUs were issued or renewed during 2017-18, the officials said.
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