Mumbai: The CBI has registered a case of cheating and forgery against film producer Jaspreet Singh Walia aka Bunty Walia, his brother, their production house GS Entertainment, it’s CA, and others, over a complaint of IDBI bank for causing a loss of Rs 15 crores.

The CBI had last week carried out searches at the premises of GS Entertainment directors Bunty Walia and Guneet Singh Walia (Jassi Walia) and Stany Saldanha (CA).

It is alleged that the production house had in 2009 taken a loan for the making of Sanjay Dutt starrer movie Lamhaa, but the film did not release. The CBI FIR stated that GS Entertainment had taken a credit from IDBI bank. The budget of the film was around Rs 30 crores, of which Rs. 15 crores was bank loan and the rest was arranged by the production house.

Subsequently, the movie was released in 2010 by PVR through a tripartite agreement with G S Entertainment and the bank but they too suffered a loss. The bank alleged that the production house benefited from the deal. The bank took the responsibility of releasing the film after appointing PVR as sole distributor for its worldwide release.

There was a commitment from PVR to invest Rs 8 crores for expenditure on publicity and completion of the balance post-production work. However, PVR failed to honour its commitment as it had supposedly incurred a loss of Rs 83.9 lakhs.

Bunty Walia denied the allegation stating that it’s fabricated, as they suffered heavy loss in the film and despite sharing all the details the bank officials kept on insisting him to “settle the issue”.

He said, “There was a collision between a bank official and their appointed auditor to declare me willful defaulter, so that they can approach the CBI. I had not received any money out of the movie. The auditor gave a fabricated report against me. The bank has been threatening me to settle the issue or they will approach the CBI. Even the auditor insisted on settlement which we refused. So they filed a case.”