NEW DELHI, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- Indian Finance Minister Arun Jaitley Tuesday broke his silence on the massive 1.8-billion-U.S. dollar bank fraud that came to light last week, saying authorities will chase down whosoever cheats the banking system.
Apparently blaming the bank management and auditors for failing to live up to their task, Jaitley said: "On the face of it, it seems they (bank officials and auditors) were. Supervisory agencies should ensure that stray cases are nipped in the bud and they are never repeated."
The bank fraud is centred around billionaire jeweller Nirav Modi, who has fled the country and was reportedly last seen in New York after his appearance at World Economic Forum in Davos as a part of an Indian delegation.
Modi is said to have defrauded Punjab National Bank, India's second largest state-run bank, of 1.8 billion U.S. dollars, though he said that he owed the bank only 775 million U.S. dollars, in a letter.
Though India has not yet formally charged the billionaire and only suspended his passport as well as his uncle and business partner Mehul Choksi's for four weeks, investigators have arrested some bank officials allegedly involved in the fraud.
