Lucknow, April 1: In a significant judgment, a special court of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in Lucknow has convicted five accused, including a senior manager of the Bank of India, in a bank fraud case dating back to 2006.
The court sentenced Naresh Chander Bhardwaj, then Senior Manager of Bank of India’s Lal Bangla branch in Kanpur, along with four private individuals—Sadhna Dixit, Ram Ji Shukla, Jitendra Srivastava, and Prem Prakash—to three years of imprisonment. The court also imposed a total fine of ₹3.4 lakh on the convicted persons.
According to the CBI, the case was registered on January 11, 2008, following a complaint by the bank’s zonal office in Kanpur. Investigations revealed that during July to October 2006, Bhardwaj, in collusion with co-accused and other unknown persons, fraudulently processed and sanctioned three loans—including housing, mortgage, and auto loans—using forged and fictitious documents.
The loans were issued in the names of non-existent or pseudonymous borrowers, resulting in a wrongful loss of ₹41.50 lakh to the bank, while the accused allegedly pocketed illegal gains.
After completing its probe, the CBI filed a chargesheet in April 2010. Following a prolonged trial, the court found all five accused guilty and pronounced the sentence accordingly.
The conviction marks the culmination of a long-pending case, underlining the agency’s continued focus on cracking down on banking fraud and financial irregularities.
