The Income Tax department today conducted raids at the office of Kotak Mahindra Bank at Kasturba Gandhi Marg in the national capital and detected 9 fake accounts with about Rs 34 crore in deposits.
Two persons, who were operating these fake accounts, were also arrested, police said
The IT sleuths carried out the search while working on the leads exacted from some of the Axis Bank accounts that were under the scanner, reports say.
“About Rs 34 crore in old currency notes found in nine fake accounts, which was opened with the help of Bank manager and his staff,” Crime Branch said in its statement.
Earlier today, Kotak Mahindra Bank had said that it raised the issue with the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) of the Finance Ministry regarding the accounts.
The bank continues to deny that there were any fake accounts. According to Rohit Rao, spokesperson of the Kotak Mahindra Bank, no deficiencies in the KYC norms were found.
“It is on our observation of two suspicious accounts that we reported to the FIU and basis that the I-T department visited the KG Marg branch to investigate two of its customers and had questioned the branch manager," he said.
Earlier yesterday, Axis Bank found itself under the scanner of the Income Tax department again after deposits of Rs 89 crore were found in 19 suspicious accounts.
Earlier this month, the I-T department had raided an Axis Bank branch in Central Delhi’s Chandni Chowk and reportedly found out about 44 fake accounts. According to reports, I-T officials had said that about Rs 100 crore in old notes had been deposited in the accounts since November 8.
