Petulant Retreat

THERE are no heroes in this flip-flop saga. When Tamil Maanila Congress (TMC) supremo G.K. Moopanar adm-itted that M. Gopalakrishnan, former chairman of Indian Bank and the man responsible for the 80-year-old nationalised bank's ruination, into his party fold, it was a blatant display of arrogance. When, just days later, on August 30, he dumped Gopalakrishnan, it was petulant retreat.

Gopalakrishnan's patron Moopanar sees a plot in the 'media-orchestrated' smear campaign against his protege. For the year ended March 1996, Indian Bank has announced accumulated losses of Rs 1,712 crore—the largest ever loss in the country's banking history. The bank's entire capital base has been wiped out. Moopanar's admitting Gopalakrishnan into TMC was seen by all as a cover-up operation to protect an unworthy protege. The resulting uproar has forced the TMC to back down. Gopalakrishnan has now "voluntarily" resigned from the party as he "did not want to cause any embarrassment to the TMC," and "he would rejoin it after his name was cleared by investigatingagencies."

Moopanar sees a conspiracy in the "media-orchestrated smear campaign" against Gopalakrishnan. "By tarnishing his name, the present management of Indian Bank is trying to tarnish the image of TMC. I will ask the Finance Minister to take a serious view of the matter. P. Chidambaram is a member of TMC first, and a minister later." Gopalakrishnan's rise is directly linked to Moopanar's fortunes. In '87, in the aftermath of Bofors and the Indo-Sri Lankan accord, Moopanar became Rajiv Gandhi's trusted lieutenant, and Gopalakrishnan became Indian Bank's executive director. In '88, Moopanar organised the AICC session at Marai-malai Nagar near Madras, and Gopalakrishnan became chairman. In '90, then finance minister Madhu Dandavate questioned his style of functioning, but before he could take action, the V.P. Singh government collapsed. Later, the bank doled out crores to various cronies of Congressmen.

 In 1994, the RBI asked the Centre not to give an extension to Gopalakrishnan, whose original term ended in 1993. But its advice went unheeded. Gopalakrishnan's tenure was extended as many as seven times and he eventually retired in December 1995.

Spotting gross attempts to pass off loans gone bad as Standard Assets, the RBI had asked Gopalakrishnan to recast the 1994-95 balance sheet. When he refused, the central bank asked the Finance Ministry to sack him. Again, nothing happened. Says Gopalakrishnan: "In 1995, RBI asked at least seven banks to recast their balance-sheets. It couldn't be done in Indian Bank because of legal impediments."

 Most of the beneficiaries of Gopalakrishnan's largesse are now being told to cough up at least 50 per cent of the money they owe the bank. Of the total provisioning of non-performing assets (NPAs) worth Rs 1,112 crore, efforts are being made to "recover" Rs 500 crore. In a strange coincidence, the quantum of money to be recovered in a short while is almost equal to the amount wrongly classified as Standard Assets instead of NPAs by Gopalakrishnan. Thus, the recovery may wrongly prove that Gopalakrishnan was right. 

In the process, do not be surprised if present chairman S. Raja gopalan, who refused to cover up the mess, loses his job, and Gopalakrishnan reappears as a TMC politician in a few months.