Diamond Jubilee Co-op Bank downs shutters
By Our Banking Bureau | 02 Sep 2002
Ahmedabad: The Surat-based Diamond Jubilee Cooperative Bank (DJCB), with a deposit base of Rs 169 crore, has closed shutters. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has suspended the clearing operations at all the branches of DJCB.
The cooperative bank, which had reportedly been witnessing a run on its eight branches in Surat for the past few days, is reported to have exposed itself heavily to the real estate industry.
Out of the total advances of Rs 130 crore, a real estate developer, C R Patil, who is also the chairman of Gujarat Alkalies and Chemicals, alone had a loan portfolio of Rs 42 crore from the bank. Sources in Surat say the exposure, through Patils associates, is much higher at nearly Rs 75 crore.
The depositors of the bank have charged the state government and the RBI with shirking their responsibility in the cooperative bank scams by passing the buck to each other. Many healthy cooperative banks were coerced into infusing low interest funds into MMCB, whose branches are up and running once again.
