CBI grills Rotomac pens owner, son in Delhi over Rs 3,695 cr loan

New Delhi: The CBI said that Vikram Kothari, promoter of Rotomac pens, and his son Rahul Kothari, are being questioned at its headquarter in Delhi in connection with a Rs 3,695 crore loan default case. The two were brought to the national capital from Uttar Pradesh’s Kanpur .
The CBI had also carried out raids at the billionaire’s residence and establishments in Kanpur.
The father-son duo was also questioned all day .
Denying any wrongdoing, Vikram Kothari has said, “Yes, I took a loan from the bank but it is wrong information that I haven’t paid.”
The CBI registered a case after the Bank of Baroda, one of the banks from which Vikram Kothari had taken loans, filed a complaint of loan default against him.
Kothari had obtained Rs 2,919 crore from the consortium of seven banks — Bank of India (Rs 754.77 crore), Bank of Baroda (Rs 456.63 crore), Indian Overseas Bank (Rs 771.07 crore), Union Bank of India (Rs 458.95 crore), Allahabad Bank (Rs 330.68 crore), Bank of Maharashtra (Rs 49.82 crore) and Oriental Bank of Commerce (Rs 97.47 crore), the FIR by the CBI said.
The Rotomac case came just days after the CBI initiated probe into the massive PNB fraud in which bank officials of the state-owned Punjab National Bank assisted diamantaire Nirav Modi and others get credit from overseas banks using fake guarantees.
According to a report in NDTV, Kothari was declared a wilful defaulter in February 2017. He contested it in the Allahabad High Court and won but allegedly didn’t pay his dues. All through 2017, various properties belonging to him and his family members were auctioned by banks in an attempt to recover some of their dues.
Despite his financial troubles, Kothari has maintained his lavish lifestyle. His sprawling 4,000 square yard ‘Santushti’ mansion and a fleet of luxury vehicles are well known in Kanpur.
Vikram Kothari’s father Mansukhbhai Kothari established the ‘Pan Parag’ brand that went on to become a huge success.
In 1999, after the Kotharis split, Vikram took charge of the family’s stationery and pens enterprise while his younger brother Deepak Kothari took control of the Pan Parag empire.