A special CBI court has issued non-bailable warrants against billionaire jewellers Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi on CBI request.
This comes amid the ongoing investigations conducted by the agency. On Friday, the CBI questioned former deputy governor of the Reserve Bank Harun Rashid Khan in connection with bank scams involving the jewellers and relaxation of gold import rules in 2014 by the erstwhile UPA government allegedly to the benefit of private traders.
Khan is the senior-most former official of the RBI to be questioned by the CBI in connection with the $2 billion scam in Punjab National Bank, considered the biggest in the financial history of the country, they said.
The sources said his questioning revolved around the policy framework of the time when fraudulent Letters of Undertaking (LoUs) were issued by Punjab National Bank (PNB) to the firms of Modi and Choksi.
He was also questioned on the '20:80' gold import scheme, which was cleared by then finance minister P Chidambaram on May 13, 2014, barely three days before the counting of votes of the general election, they said. The scheme had allegedly helped Choksi's company and a few other make windfall gains.
The CBI investigation into the matter came four weeks after the NDA government had issued a statement saying it would act against people who relaxed gold import rules for private trading houses during the previous dispensation.
The BJP-led NDA came to power at the Centre, defeating the UPA in the 2014 election.
In a statement, the government had said the UPA government's '20:80 scheme' resulted in a windfall of Rs 4,500 crore to 13 trading houses in six months.
The BJP had last month accused Chidambaram of aiding jewellers Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi, the main accused in the Rs 12,600-crore fraud at Punjab National Bank, through the 20:80 gold import scheme.
(With PTI inputs)
