While receiving the prestigious IDRBT Banking Technology Excellence Award for the year 2016-17, Pune based the Cosmos Co-operative Bank claimed yet again that it has 20 lacs “satisfied” customers.
In a press release the UCB claims “The Cosmos Co-operative Bank Ltd., is a leading bank in co-operative sector, with a set-up of more than Rs. 25000 crore. It has 140 branches across 7 states with a more than 20 lac satisfied customers.
At least one of the customers Vinay Aranha of the Rosary education group was not “satisfied” who had filed a private complaint accusing the bank’s board members of a conspiracy to show him as a ‘wilful defaulter’. He alleged that the bank officials forged documents for maliciously recovering the entire loan amount even when he was regularly paying the loan installments.
Acting on an order by the Pune cantonment court, the city police had in the past booked 15 board members of the Cosmos Bank for alleged criminal conspiracy, forgery and cheating in a Rs 46.50 crore loan deal involving of the Rosary education group.
In September 2015 last year, the bank had lodged an FIR against Vinay and his father, Vivek Anthony alias Alphonso Aranha, the other partner in the group, accusing them of furnishing a forged and fabricated non-agriculture (NA) order for an agricultural land in Talegaon Dabhade as a collateral to for availing the loan in 2013.
On February 10 2016, the Bombay high court granted anticipatory bail to the Aranhas while making a prima facie observation that the applicants neither suppressed the fact that the property was an agricultural land nor it could be held that they had knowledge about the pending law suit.
Coming to Award, it was received on behalf of the Bank by Ms. Arti Dhole, Managing Director of Cosmos eSolutions Pvt. Ltd. and Mr Vishwas Agale, General Manager, Southern Region, Cosmos Bank.
The awards were given by Mr. B. P. Kanungo, Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India, at a function in Hyderabad.