India agency searches Jet Airways' premises in $66 million fraud case - source

BENGALURU (Reuters) - India's federal investigating agency is searching the premises of Jet Airways and the residence of founder Naresh Goyal in Mumbai as part of a probe into a 5.39 billion rupee ($66 million) bank fraud case, a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) source said on Friday.

The searches came days after Canara Bank filed a complaint against the airline, Goyal, his wife and a former airline director for "causing wrongful loss" to the lender, according to a May 3 first information report seen by Reuters.

Jet Airways did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. Goyal could not be immediately reached.

Canara Bank alleged that funds were diverted for purposes unrelated to the airline's operations.

Once India's biggest private airline, Jet ran out of cash in April 2019 and filed for bankruptcy. It was supposed to resume operations by the first quarter of 2022 under its new owners. However, it is deadlocked with creditors over the resolution plan to lift the airline out of bankruptcy.

($1 = 81.7570 Indian rupees)

(Reporting by Hritam Mukherjee and Chris Thomas in Bengaluru; Editing by Dhanya Ann Thoppil and Anil D'Silva)