Prudential plight goes to court

HYDERABAD: Justice L Narasimha Reddy of the High Court on Tuesday admitted a writ petition questioning RBI''s order cancelling the licence of Prudential Cooperative Urban Bank.
The petition, filed by Prudential shareholder Surya Prakash Rao, contends that RBI''s cancellation order came just when the bank was on the verge of recovery. It also challenges the appointment of a liquidator by the state government, stating that empowering the official to extend a one-time settlement offer to loan defaulters would cause a loss to the bank and its shareholders.
The collapse of the bank was the subject of heated exchanges between Congress and TDP members in the Assembly, each blaming the other for allowing the bank to come to this pass.
Leader of the opposition Chandrababu Naidu accused the government of being insensitive to the plight of 1.80 lakh depositors and alleged that it was trying to protect select defaulters such as Y Rajeev Reddy and MLAs J Krishna Rao and Malreddy Ranga Reddy. Rajiv Reddy was related to the chief minister, he pointed out.
Cooperation minister K Lakshminarayana said Naidu had no right to criticise the government as he had failed to prevent the liquidation of 16 cooperative banks during his nine years in power.