MARGAO
A new year has dawned, but curtains are yet to come down on the exercise initiated in mid-2021 to return the hard earned money of beleaguered depositors of the Madgaum Urban Cooperative Bank under liquidation.
While the Liquidator-appointed officials say the bank is in the process of settling the claims made by depositors falling below the Rs 5 lakh deposit bracket, the fate of the depositors, whose total deposits aggregate whopping around Rs 40 crore, hangs in balance.
Take note, the MUCB has assets and properties, besides pending recoveries to the tune of over Rs 40 crore, offering a ray of hope for the beleaguered depositors to receive their deposits in the near future. Sources, however, say that unless and until the value of the assets and properties is realised, there’s no question of early return of the deposits of the beleaguered depositors.
The list of depositors falling in the category of deposits above Rs 5 lakh may be less, around 350-odd depositors to be precise, compared to the thousands of depositors whose deposits are less than Rs 5 lakh. What, however, may come to haunt the Liquidator-appointed officials is that this miniscule number of depositors have deposits pegged around Rs 40 crore, throwing up a question how the Liquidator will go about doing the payments of the depositors.
Inquiries have only revealed that the Liquidator-appointed officials are presently busy and preoccupied with the task of settling the claims of depositors, whose deposits falls below Rs 5 lakh category. In fact, officials have claimed that of the 10,000-odd depositors out of the 56,365 total depositors, claims of 99 per cent of the depositors have been settled till date.
Says Liquidator-appointed designated officer, Kishore Amonkar: “As far as the claims made by the depositors on deposits less than Rs 5 lakh, we have settled almost all the claims, barring around 60 cases. We are in the process of capping the process of settling the claims of these small depositors.”
Amonkar, however, conceded that the Liquidator will now take up the issue of settling the claims of depositors, whose deposits exceed the Rs 5 lakh category. “We will now focus on the disposal of claims made by depositors whose deposits exceed the Rs 5 lakh amount,” he said.
The exercise may not appear difficult considering the fact that the MUCB has assets worth over Rs 20 crore and pending recoveries to the tune of over Rs 20 crore. But, the fact remains that unless the value of the bank assets is realised and the recoveries effected, the assets and the recoveries will remain only on paper.
Information has revealed that the four bank premises, including the head office, Aquem, and the buildings housing the Margao, Panaji and Benaulim branch, besides shops, apartments and plots is expected to bring revenue to the tune of crores of rupees. Sources, however, informed that the exercise of auctioning these properties have not evoked the desired response from prospective bidders as a result of which the assets and properties could not be disposed of till date.
Says Amonkar: “We want to reassure the depositors having more than Rs 5 lakh deposits that they need not worry about their deposits. The bank has sufficient assets, besides properties which can fetch income to settle the claims of the depositors.”
Considering the huge number of deposits, Amonkar said, the Liquidator has decided to settle the claims of depositors in phases. “Assuming that the bank received money by way of disposal of assets, the amount will be equally distributed to settle the claims of all the depositors. Say tomorrow, the bank receives Rs 20 crore revenue, the same will be distributed to settle 50 per cent of the claims of the depositors,” he added.
FLASHBACK: THE LIQUIDATION
- The MUCB with around 56,635 depositors went into liquidation in August 2021 after the RBI withdrew the banking licence issued for the bank headquartered in Margao
- Reason cited by the RBI is that there is no improvement in the financial position of the MUCB and the affairs of the bank are being conducted in a manner detrimental to the interests of the depositors
- However, it was only in May 2022 that the bank Liquidator kick-started the process of returning back the deposits to the beleaguered depositors
- It would be three years in July 2024 that the RBI had cancelled the banking licence of MUCB. While the Liquidator has claimed to have settled claims of 99 per cent of depositors, depositors in the category of deposits above Rs 5 lakh, are still awaiting return of their claims
