Central bureau of investigation (CBI) has launched a multi-pronged probe into alleged bank frauds involving companies of the Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani (ADA) group, registering separate first information reports (FIRs) and carrying out searches in Mumbai and Pune — including at the residence of Jai Anmol Ambani, son of industrialist Anil Ambani — in connection with suspected fund diversion and financial misconduct.
Officials confirmed on Tuesday that the agency has booked Jai Anmol Ambani and Reliance Home Finance Ltd (RHFL) for allegedly cheating Union Bank of India to the tune of ₹228 crore, based on a detailed complaint from the lender (formerly Andhra Bank). The FIR also names former RHFL director Ravindra Sharad Sudhakar and unidentified public officials.
According to the complaint, Union Bank had sanctioned ₹450 crore in credit limits to RHFL for business operations, subject to strict financial discipline, timely repayment and transparent routing of sale proceeds. RHFL allegedly defaulted on repayments, following which the account was classified as a non-performing asset on 30 September 2019.
A forensic audit by Grant Thornton, covering the period from 1 April 2016 to 30 June 2019, reportedly found evidence of fund diversion, account manipulation, and the misuse of borrowed funds for purposes not approved by the lender. The Bank alleged the acts amounted to criminal breach of trust, conspiracy and siphoning of funds by the company’s former promoters and directors, including Jai Anmol Ambani.
Acting on the FIR, CBI conducted searches at multiple locations, including the residence of Jai Anmol Ambani in Mumbai, officials say. The agency is expected to scrutinise financial statements, loan utilisation records and transactions flagged in the forensic report to identify potential beneficiary entities.
In a separate but parallel action, CBI has also registered a criminal case against Reliance Commercial Finance Ltd (RCFL) — another company under the Reliance ADA group — its promoters, directors and unknown bank officials, after a complaint from Bank of Maharashtra alleging a ₹57.47 crore fraud.
Bank of Maharashtra declared RCFL’s loan account as a non-performing asset (NPA) on 25 March 2020 and classified it as fraud on 4 October 2025. The Bank alleged RCFL was part of a much larger borrowing pattern, availing ₹9,280 crore from 31 banks, financial institutions, non-banking finance companies (NBFCs) and corporate bodies.
On 9 December 2025, after securing warrants from a special CBI court in Mumbai, the agency conducted searches at RCFL’s Mumbai office and the Pune residence of its director Devang Pravin Mody, recovering what officials described as incriminating documents.
The investigations mark a significant escalation in scrutiny of the Reliance ADA group’s financial operations, adding to existing enforcement actions by other agencies. In a related development, the directorate of enforcement (ED) has filed a supplementary chargesheet against Reliance Power Ltd and 10 others in the case involving allegedly fake bank guarantees worth ₹68 crore submitted to the Solar Energy Corporation of India (SECI) to secure a project tender. ED has also attached assets worth ₹5.15 crore as purported proceeds of crime.
Reliance Power, in a regulatory filing, says the 'allegations have not yet passed judicial scrutiny' and emphasised that the company has not been held guilty of any wrongdoing, adding that it will have the opportunity to present its case before the court.
With simultaneous probes by CBI and ED now underway into multiple companies linked to the Ambani-led group — ranging from housing finance and commercial lending to the power sector — investigators are expected to examine patterns of loan utilisation, inter-company transactions and the role of senior officials across several entities.
The latest actions, especially CBI’s case naming Anil Ambani’s son, signal an intensifying regulatory focus on corporate governance failures and suspected fund diversion within distressed financial services companies of the Reliance ADA group.
what followed has been well described as a ponzi scheme. The CBI chargesheet is infact a regulatory clash with SEBI. The market regulator was the first authority to penalize Anil Ambani by levying a hefty 625 cr penalty on his entities and barring him from capital markets. Interesting one of the companies names was CLE (Crest Logistics) which again is under scanner for 10,000 crore plus unpaid loans to Reliance Infrastructure. Jai Anmol Ambani did not feature in the list of persons who were slammed by SEBI. However Ravindra Sudhalkar, the official name in CBI FIR, was rapped by SEBI. Some other entities which were named in Fake Bank Guarantee Chargesheet were also named by SEBI.
Rightly termed as a ponzi scheme in detailed analysis by Ranganathan Ji in Moneylife earlier, the bank loans / public funds which disappeared were ultimately either used to clear old debt (evergreening), or siphoned off offshore...
The CBI FIR doesnt seem to have taken note of SEBI's detailed report which slammed Anil Ambani alongwith his shadow entities.
30th September 2019 is a very important date... The date when Union Bank (earlier Andhra Bank) declared RHFL a NPA. Incidentally, Anil Ambani's Chief Strategist ended his innings as Director of Reliance Capital on the same day, after a 16 1/2 year continued tenure. The big question is, was it Amitabh Jhunjhunwala who masterminded the listing of Reliance Home Finance, being the Group CFO and RCAP's oldest and senior most executive director.
If the agencies delve deeper, it was not Jai Anmol who set up Anil Ambani's alter ego RHFL. Nor was it Ashok Kumar Pal or Punit Garg who managed the second alter ego CLE (Crest Logistics).. If RHFL was Jhunjhuna Wala's baby, CLE was under guardianship of Sateesh Seth. So why only Jai Anmol and a few executives who merely commissioned the pass through entries.
Luckily for the investigators, Grant Thronton does qualify as an auditor under RBI's latest circular, so there wont be prolonged legal battles Anil Ambani camp can deploy to delay and diffuse the case. If Jai Anmol indeed gets charge sheeted, he would be paying for his fathers deed.. and if Jai Anmol ends up paying for his fathers deeds, then why spare Abhinav Jhunjhunwala or Nayan Seth and Harsh Seth.. It would be incidental that 2019 also appears to be significant dates in the business operations of Abhinav Jhunjhunwala in Singapore; and for that matter Tech Barrack Solutions LLP that sons of Sateesh Seth founded in 2019.
The year when Amitabh Jhunjhunwala became ex-Anil Ambani employee; and moved base to Singapore for handling his billons offshore. Sateesh Seth too resigned from a number of companies in 2019.. Reliance ADA Group Ltd., Reliance Telecom Ltd., Mumbai Metro and Reliance Naval... Was the Group planning to close the old can of worms; only to fill a new one by making RInfra and RPower debt free through a serious of transactions involving Crest Logistics (formerly Sonata Investments - a promoter group company). 4 months have passed after Anil Ambani's attempted coup, yet Varde Partners (through a Singapore entity) isn't bothered about the hundreds of millions they put in his listed companies. Nor is infamous market operator bothered about his 925 Cr he invested in 2024.. And happily bought Reliance Home Finance to brush Anil Ambani's deeds under the carpet.
Are Varde Partner and Sanjay Dangi funds supervised by none other than the financial wizard Amitabh Thakore Prasad Jhunjhunwala, the man who controls AJ Capital, and used to control TAJ Capital Partners while a KMP of Anil Ambani's listed entities for over 16 years.