TOI : ICICI Bank pays Rs 15.5L to kin of borrower who ended life : Sept 28, 2007
ICICI Bank pays Rs 15.5L to kin of borrower who ended life
TIMES NEWS NETWORK
Mumbai: A little more than a week after Andheri resident Prakash Sarvankar
committed suicide following harassment by loan recovery agents appointed by
ICICI Bank, his family has received an ex gratia payment of Rs 15.50 lakh
from the bank. This includes a fixed
deposit of about Rs 10 lakh which will be maintained with ICICI Bank at 9.5%
interest per annum for about five years. This will ensure a monthly payout
of about Rs 8,000 for the family.
“The money will not get my husband back, but it will help secure my
kids’
future,” his widow Priyanka said. “I want to thank the media for following
up the issue. No borrower should ever suffer the way we have. Recovery
agents had threatened to seal our house if my husband didn’t pay up, and
they humiliated him in public.”
The ex gratia payment was made in direct consultation with Sarvankar’s
family.
City police commissioner D N Jadhav on Thursday held a meeting with over
50 bank officials and discussed the issue of recovering loan dues and the
alleged harassment of bank customers. ICICI to record agent-client
conversations
Mumbai: ICICI Bank has decided to record all tele-conversations between
recovery agents and clients following the suicide of Prakash Sarvankar, who
was hounded by some recovery agents after he failed to return part of the
Rs-50,000 loan he had taken from the bank. Training of agencies to sensitise
them to such cases is also being undertaken.
The bank decided to make an ex-gratia payment of Rs 15.5 lakh (report on
Page 1) in direct consultation with Sarvankar’s family. It is learnt that
the bank did not want any ‘go-betweens’ to take advantage of the situation
which explains why it chose to go in for the fixed deposit route rather than
full payment in cheque.
ICICI Bank has submitted a report to the Reserve Bank of India on this
particular case as also on its future course of action while dealing with
similar cases. In order to avoid getting embroiled in such incidents in
future, the bank has decided to carry out a police verification of all its
1,300 credit card recovery agents and 400-odd auto loan recovery agents.
The bank has already terminated the services of the recovery agency,
Nishant Associates, which was involved in the Sarvankar case. The four
arrested accused, Nishant Nagrale who ran the agency, his employees Hiren
Vaidya and Tushar Pargavkar and ICICI staffer Kailash Chaudhary, have been
remanded in police custody till Friday.
The payment made to Sarvankar’s family includes an investment-based
insurance plan for Sarvankar’s wife that would offer a life cover of Rs 25
lakh over 20 years. The plan would fetch lumpsum maturity benefits at the
end of 20 years as decided by the insurance firm. It includes a medical
cover of Rs 4 lakh individually for the wife and individual medical cover of
Rs 3 lakh each for three years for the three daughters. Subject to policy
conditions, the cover is cashless covering all hospitalisation expenses. The
premium will be borne by the Bank.
Sarvankar (38) had taken a loan of Rs 50,000 from the bank earlier this
year, but was unable to repay all the instalments on grounds of illness. On
September 17, he hanged himself in his one-room
Malpa Dongri residence, leaving a suicide note which stated that harassment
from the recovery agents had driven him to take the drastic step.
Priyanka is employed as a security guard with an agency at Seepz. The
couple has three daughters, Pranita (9), Prajakta (6) and Prachi (3).
Sarvankar had borrowed money from two other institutions too and was in the
process of repaying the instalments. His brother Subhash told TOI that the
Credit Card Consumers’ Association of India helped the family. “It wrote a
letter to the bank on our behalf, following which bank officials approached
us for a discussion.”
Publication:Times of India Mumbai; Date:Sep 28, 2007; Section:Front Page;
Page Number:1