Kerala: 10 FIRs filed for default on loans from Kuwait bank

Kochi: At least 10 FIRs have been filed across Kerala against health care workers from the state in connection with wilful defaults on loans taken from the Gulf Bank in Kuwait, police officers said.

The FIRs are part of a large-scale fraud amounting to nearly ₹700 crore at the Kuwait City-based bank allegedly committed by at least 1245 health care workers, including nurses, from Kerala. The workers are accused of availing the bank loans with the help of their salary certificates, then migrating to other countries, or returning to India for good, and defaulting on those loans.

Thomas J Anakkalunkal, an advocate at the Kerala high court who the Kuwaiti bank consulted to help initiate legal action against the accused in Kerala, told HT that the bank has a list of around 1,425 Indians who have defaulted on loans of which 1,245 are from the southern state.

“Many of the accused are nurses who used to work with the Ministry of Health (MoH) in Kuwait. They obtained small and big loans from the bank with the help of their salary certificates mostly during and after the Covid pandemic. But they were found to have defaulted on those loans, some of them with a tenure of 10 or 15 years, after paying just a few EMIs. Many of them are suspected to have gotten job offers in other countries and ended up migrating there without paying off the loans,” claimed Thomas.

The bank has filed official complaints with the state director general of police’s office based on which FIRs were registered across police stations, mostly in the Ernakulam district, under charges of cheating and criminal breach of trust over the past one month, he added.

“Even though the fraud took place outside India, action can still be taken against the accused here. Some of the defaulters are reported to be in the state while a majority of them are abroad. More FIRs are expected to be filed in the coming days. The Union Home Ministry has also taken note of it,” the lawyer added.

HT has reviewed some of the FIRs; the loan amounts range from ₹63.24 lakh to ₹1.25 crore in these.

The circle inspector at Puthencruz PS, who did not want to be identified, told HT that in the case of one of the FIRs, the probe was heading in the right direction and that details of the accused, a female nurse, were being verified.

“We have booked the case based on the complaint filed by Mohammad Abdul Vassey Kamran, deputy general manager of consumer credits at Gulf Bank. The accused is a nurse who owes the bank ₹93.10 lakh in loan dues. We are still investigating,” he said.

At the Kalady police station, where a case has been booked against a former lab technician for defaulting on a loan worth ₹98 lakh, a policeman said efforts are on to locate the accused.

“We have information that the accused is still in the country and we are closely watching his residence here,” the officer added, asking not to be named.

He added that since there are multiple cases being probed in Kerala in connection with the alleged fraud, there are chances of the Crime Branch division taking up the case.