ED froze shares worth appx Rs 2K cr, not Rs 143 cr: Manappuram Finance MD

Chennai, May 5 (IANS) The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has frozen his shares worth about Rs 2,000 crore, and not around Rs 143 crore, V.P. Nandakumar, Managing Director, Manappuram Finance Ltd, said on Friday.

The listed company has filed with the bourses the response received from Nandakumar on the recent ED searches and the freezing of his assets.

The ED on Thursday said that it had recently conducted searches at six premises in Thrissur, Kerala, belonging to Manappuram Finance Limited and its MD Nandakumar, and froze Rs 143 crore lying in various accounts.

The searches were conducted as part of an investigation under the PMLA into the allegations of money laundering from illegal collection of deposits from the public.

The ED searches resulted in the detection of evidence regarding money laundering and large-scale cash transactions in the form of public deposits, allegedly done by Nandakumar through his proprietary firm, Manappuram Agro Farms (MAGRO), without RBI's approval.

Nandakumar in a clarification to the Board of Manappuram Finance said: "The shares that have been frozen by the Enforcement Directorate are worth approximately Rs 2,000 crore, but the value attributed to them is around Rs 140 crore. I am reviewing my legal options in this matter, but I wanted to provide you a written update on the matter."

"Firstly, the total amount of pending deposits to which the matter pertains (as I explain below) is less than Rs 10 lakh which is lying lying in escrow account," he added.

Nandakumar said that MAGRO used to accept deposits from people residing at Valapad and its neighbouring areas where his family had done business for over 60 years and pays interest to them.

"The total quantum of deposits outstanding as on February 1, 2012 was Rs 143.85 crore, which was fully and duly accounted for in MARGO's books," his letter said.

According to Nandakumar, on receipt of a communication from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) in 2012, MAGRO had stopped accepting, renewing and soliciting deposits and decided to repay all its deposits.

"In March 2012, I raised an amount of Rs 159,45,62,582 through sale of shares in [the company] for repayment of the deposit amounts," he said.

"As on December 31, 2022, MARGO has repaid deposits of a total amount of Rs 143.76 crore and the total outstanding amount remaining in the escrow amount is only Rs 9,24,693. This balance is outstanding only because certain depositors have failed to claim their respective deposits," he added.

Nandakumar claimed that the ED's visit was in pursuant to an FIR lodged by an individual as a lapse of more than 10 years in relation to the deposit acceptance.