B R Shetty, founder of the NMC Healthcare group, has filed a lawsuit in the Bombay High Court seeking $15 billion in damages from state-owned Bank of Baroda (BoB) and 25 other defendants, alleging that the bank and former NMC executives enabled the diversion of funds, concealed liabilities and subsequently pursued him on guarantees bearing forged signatures.
Shetty has sought $5 billion each in direct and consequential damages against the defendants jointly and severally, and a further $5 billion from BoB for alleged reputational damage and loss of goodwill. He has also sought interest at 18 per cent a year.
The suit names BoB and 10 of its officers, former NMC and UAE Exchange/Finablr executives Prasanth and Promoth Manghat, their wives and other associates, as well as two Indian entities — Avitis Super Speciality Hospitals and SMARD Building Solutions — which Shetty alleges hold assets acquired using diverted funds.
An email seeking Bank of Baroda’s response to the lawsuit did not elicit a reply from the bank till press time.
According to the lawsuit, Shetty relinquished control of the group companies in 2012 and stepped down as chief executive officer in March 2017. He alleges that he learnt only in early 2020 that he remained NMC’s chairman, following which he resigned. The lawsuit claims that former executives used forged instructions and signatures to route funds through personal and corporate accounts, making it appear that he was involved in the transactions.
The suit also alleges that BoB ignored repeated anti-money laundering (AML) alerts, extended credit without adequate security, facilitated transactions through supplier accounts allegedly used for round-tripping and concealed its lending exposure from auditors. It also accuses certain bank officials of accepting gifts and failing to act on warning signs despite internal scrutiny. These allegations have not been established by a court.
One of the key allegations concerns balance confirmations prepared for auditor EY. According to the lawsuit, 15 confirmations were prepared, but only 11 reached the auditor.
Shetty has also challenged BoB’s pursuit of guarantees attributed to him, maintaining that the signatures were forged and that the bank continued to rely on them despite allegedly becoming aware of the concealment of liabilities.
Back in July, BoB agreed to pay $600 million (about ₹5,700 crore) to settle litigation arising from the collapse of NMC Health, bringing to an end years of cross-border legal proceedings linked to one of West Asia’s biggest corporate failures. Under the settlement agreement, NMC Health, NMC Healthcare, NMC Holding and their joint administrators have resolved all claims and causes of action against Bank of Baroda without any admission of liability or wrongdoing by the lender.
The litigation stemmed from the collapse of NMC Health, once the Gulf’s largest private healthcare provider, which entered administration in 2020 after billions of dollars of previously undisclosed debt came to light. The joint administrators subsequently initiated proceedings in Abu Dhabi and England against NMC founder B R Shetty, former chief executive officer Prasanth Manghat and Bank of Baroda under ADGM and UK insolvency laws, as well as UAE civil law.
