Sugar stocks mortgaged against Rs11b loan removed

KARACHI: The Supreme Court directed the Federal Investigation Agency to take instant action against the chief executive officers of several sugar mills owned by the Omni Group found to have removed sugar stocks mortgaged against over Rs11 billion loan from the banks.

Hearing multi billion money laundering case on Saturday, SC’s three member bench headed by Chief Justice Mian Saqib Nisar took notice over use of cellular phone by the arrested directors of Omni group in the prison. The court directed the jail authorities to seize all mobile phone being used by the Omni group directors in the prison warning the appropriate action will be taken against the IG prisons if found involved in violation of the court orders. After the court proceedings, the family of Anwar Majeed along with his son Nimar Majeed appeared before the court. The FIA team arrested the Omni director Nimar Majeed for further investigation in the case. The head of the joint investigation team submitted that sugar stocks were mortgaged against the Rs.11 billion loan was taken away by the Omni group owned sugar mills. The court observed that FIA has its own course for taking action against the culprits involved in the fraud and directed the JIT team to submit the progress report by Tuesday.

At the start of hearing, the head of the Joint Investigation Team probing the fake accounts case Ahsan Sadiq and DG FIA Bashir Memon informed the bench that the stocks, shown against the loans of around Rs50 billion obtained from the National Bank of Pakistan, the Sindh Bank and the Summit Bank, were removed or taken away from the nine sugar mills of the Omni Group situated in different parts of the province. The court directed DG FIA to lodge FIRs against the officials of mills and also asked a lawyer, representing Omni Group, to produce the chief executive officers of the sugar mills before court. The lawyer of the Omni group told the court that the director of the company will appear before the court during the court hours. The court directed the FIA to take action as per the law and adjourned the hearing till Tuesday.