Father’s forgotten passbook makes Chilean man a millionaire overnight
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London: The discovery of a six- decade-old bank passbook made a man millionaire overnight in Chile, Reuters reported.
Exequiel Hinojosa was picking through his late father's belongings when he chanced up on a passbook.
His father saved up almost 140,000 pesos, about $160 worth today, to buy a house in the 1960s -70s.
Over the years of interest and inflation added to the sum the worth of almost over one billion pesos, which is nearly $1.2 million or Rs 8.22 crores.
Nobody in the family knew about the saving, when Exequiel Hinojosa’s father died 10 years ago.
Afterwards, the book had been buried in a box for decades until Hinojosa happened to see during house cleaning.
The bank was shut down long ago, subsequently leaving all bankbooks worthless.
However a crucial detail in the book that read '’State Guaranteed,’ came to Hinojosa’s rescue.
The promise was that the government would take control of the payments if the bank fails to do so.
The current government did not honour the commitment, forcing Hinojosa to seek legal help.
‘That money is our family's. He saved it by working really hard,’ Hinojosa was quoted as saying.
He said that he never thought ‘this process would turn into a kind of lawsuit towards the state.’
Despite multiple courts ruled in favor of Hinojosa, the government went ahead appealing against each verdict.
‘If the justice system, the supreme court, the court of appeals rule in my favour, all that's left to fix the problem is paying what is due, nothing more, nothing less,’ Hinojosa was quoted as saying.
Finally the Supreme Court ruled the government to pay him, 1 billion Chilean Pesos alongside accrued interest and allowances.
