Kamal Ghorui
NEW DELHI: The CBI has arrested two senior executives of Reliance Communications (RCOM) as part of its deepening investigation into allegations of financial irregularities.Joint president D Vishwanath and vice president Anil Kalya were arrested following allegations of fund misutilisation that allegedly caused substantial losses to public sector lenders.CBI registered the case based on a formal complaint lodged by the State Bank of India (SBI).The allegations pertain to sanctioned credit facilities, with SBI reporting a direct wrongful loss of Rs 2,929 crore. The FIR alleges that a consortium of 17 public sector banks and financial institutions allegedly suffered a total wrongful loss of Rs 19,694.3 crore.The development saw Reliance Group, which ran Reliance Communications after the demerger of RIL, distancing itself and Anil Ambani from RCOM. “Reliance Communications is no longer part of the Reliance Group, as the company has been undergoing CIRP since 2019 under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC), 2016, and has remained in the resolution process for nearly seven years, with proceedings still pending,” it said in a statement. “He was not involved in the day-to-day operations of the company,” the statement said. The probe revealed that Reliance Communications engaged in circuitous transactions through a network of shell entities controlled by company officials.
