In a major breakthrough, CBI and Anti-Terror Squad arrested Vadodara-based businessman Suresh N Bhatnagar and his sons — Amit and Sumit Bhatnagar — from Udaipur on Tuesday night. The trio had been on run for over one week after being booked for allegedly defrauding a consortium of 11 banks of Rs 2,654 crore.

The CBI had lodged an FIR on March 26, alleging that Bhatnagars, who run Diamond Power Infrastructure Limited (DPIL), defrauded a consortium of public and private sector banks, leaving behind an outstanding debt of Rs 2,654.40 crore as on June 29, 2016.

Last Saturday, a special CBI court, had in this case, issued non-bailable warrant against them. Anticipatory bail plea of the accused was rejected by court last week with the court observing  that “scamsters of big economic offences had fled the country and evaded justice”. “It is taken into consideration that day in and day out, generally scamsters of big economic offences are leaving the country.. and fleeing from justice. The present exposure of credit facilities from various member banks availed by the company reveals overall Rs 2,654.40 crore exposure,” the special judge N G Dave had stated in his order.

The trio were hiding at Hotel Paras Mahal in Udaipur. Gujarat ATS officials said that the CBI had sought their help to trace the trio. The local police officials were not informed of the exercise and the arrest was carried out on Tuesday night after surrounding the hotel premises with officials.

Incidentally, CBI, on Tuesday, had also moved an application, requesting the court to declare them as proclaimed offender.

The FIR against the trio stated that the firm, involved in manufacturing cables and other electrical equipment, got the term loan and credit facilities despite the fact that “they were already appearing in the defaulters’ list of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) at the time of initial sanction of credit limits by the consortium”.

With inputs from Indian Express, Ahmedabad Mirror