Echoing the statements of Reserve Bank of India Deputy Governor H.R. Khan on cobrapost.com’s findings on alleged money laundering by three private banks, Financial Services Secretary Rajiv Takru said that the issues will be fixed at a systemic level and action will be taken at an individual level.
Online magazine, cobrapost.com, had last month unearthed financial activities not permissible by law by bank officers of three major private banks.
Through its series of sting operations, cobrapost exposed bank officers at ICICI Bank, Axis Bank and HDFC Bank offering to convert tax evaded money of customers into clean money using various investment options.
Takru, however, ruled out the risk of any systemic failure.
“There is no risk of systemic failure. There are certain aberrations which we have discovered. These would be addressed both in terms of systemic factors as well as individual cases.
“Whatever responsibilities would have to be fixed will be fixed and whatever rectifications have to be done would be done,” Takru said.
He met the top brass at RBI but said that he did not recommend anything to the apex bank.
“We don’t need to recommend anything, we discuss and everybody does whatever he is supposed to do after that. RBI would be doing what they are required to do,” he clarified.
Downplaying the incident last month, K.C. Chakrabarty, Deputy Governor in-charge of banking supervision, had said, “Allegations don’t mean know-your-customer (KYC) norms have been flouted. There is not a single transaction (relating to money laundering as alleged by cobrapost) which has taken place…These are transactional issues, which have nothing to do with money laundering.”
The Financial Services Secretary also said that banks will be asked to give their version of the story on the basis of an audit report, before any action is taken against them.
“At the moment let’s understand things properly. An audit report has come. On the basis of the report, banks would probably be asked for their version. Once their version comes in, then we would decide what is to be done” Takru said.
One thing we all need to understand is there is absolutely no tearing hurry to run into some kind of hasty decision-making and in the process do something foolish, he said.
satyanarayan.iyer@thehindu.co.in