The Ruias of the Essar group are facing the brunt of investigating agencies with the CBI arresting Rishi Agarwal, relative of the Ruis and promoter of the bankrupt ABG Shipyard, in a Rs 23,000 crore bank fraud case which is being debbed as the biggest bank fraud in the country so far. The CBI has accused Mr. Agarwal of criminal breach of trsut, misappropriation, and diverting funds that were received from banks. From 2005 to 2012, the company had taken massive bank loans amounting to Rs. 22,842 crore from as many as 28 banks including ICICI Bank (Rs. 7089 crore), IDBI Bank (Rs. 3639 crore), SBI (Rs. 2925 crore), Bank of Baroda (Rs. 1614 crore), Punjab National Bank (Rs. 1244 crore), Indian Overseas Bank (Rs. 1244 crore), Bank of India (Rs. 719 crore).

The Ruias, whose steel plant was sold by the Indian banks, are at a loss for words. The family sold their stake in telecom and in the oil refinery at a huge profit and could have helped Agarwal pay off the loans. But the evidence against Agarwal for fund diversion is solid and it would be an uphill task for him to get out of the mess. The Ruias were earlier acquitted in the 2G scam, and a new scandal is coming at a very bad time when the group was planning to make a comeback via green energy.