Punjab National Bank auctions wrong house to recover loan

 

Raj Kumar, TNN Mar 12, 2012, 04.08AM IST 

PATNA: Anita Singh, 47, and her husband Dwijendra Kumar have been chasing authorities since February 16. 

That day they came to know that their only house at Adarsh Colony in Muzaffarpur had been auctioned by Punjab National Bank (PNB) to recover a loan of Rs 5 lakh which their neighbour, Ajay Sharma, had taken from PNB's Bela branch in Muzaffarpur in 1999.

Ajay of Jai Mata Di Fabrics went missing along with his family and the bank issued notices to the guarantors, including Aniruddh Prasad of East Champaran.

In his reply, Prasad informed the bank that in November 2003 he sold his land in Ajay's neighbourhood to Kusum Devi in 1981 and that he never signed any document related to any loan to Ajay. 

According to documents available with TOI, Kusum sold the land in pieces to Poonam Jha, Ram Bahadur Thakur and Anita Singh in 1997. While the Singhs and Thakurs constructed houses, Jha sold her land to one Radha Rani in 2004.

All this could have been known had the PNB, in response to Prasad's reply, bothered to check the land records in the Musahari circle office. 

Instead, the PNB moved the Debts Recovery Tribunal where it submitted the allegedly fake land documents on the basis of which the DRT, in August 2007, passed the decree in favour of PNB. Armed with the decree, the PNB auctioned Ajay's house as well as the three adjacent plots for Rs 47 lakh on February 15.

 Anita has since visited the bank's branch, regional and circle offices in Muzaffarpur. She got the advice to meet Saba Ahmad, PNB's official at its Rajapul branch in Patna.

Her husband went to Ahmad who redirected him to visit DRT.

 DRT officials refused to acknowledge the Singhs as a "party" and they were asked to hire a lawyer.