* Lawsuit accuses 33 former executives
* Accusations include fraud and price fixing
* Rato is former IMF chief, Spanish minister
* Bankia seeking 19-billion-euro bailout
* Lawsuit brought by small political party
* Former Bank of Spain governor summoned as witness
By Andres Gonzalez and Blanca Rodriguez Piedra
MADRID, July 4 (Reuters) - A Spanish court opened a fraud case on Wednesday against former executives of state-rescued lender Bankia, including one-time IMF chief Rodrigo Rato, as public rage grows with a bank which is in line for the biggest share of an EU bailout.
The lawsuit was brought by one of Spain's smaller political parties and accuses 33 officials including Rato - a former government minister who stood down as Bankia chairman in May - of fraud, price-fixing and falsifying accounts.
Under Spanish law, the crimes carry jail sentences ranging from six months to six years but commentators said that while corporate corruption cases grab the headlines in Spain, they rarely resulted in convictions. "It will be a long-running, complicated case," said Pedro Schwartz, economics professor at San Pablo University in Madrid.
Spaniards are angry with the political and business elites in general as the government of Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy has imposed austerity policies and had to seek European Union aid to save a series of banks including Bankia from collapse.
However, fury is particularly directed at Bankia as hundreds of thousands of small savers were persuaded to buy shares in the lender when it was floated on the stock market in 2011, only to see their investments all but wiped out in less than a year.
Bankia's new management has requested a 19-billion-euro (${esc.dollar}24 billion) bailout.
In the case brought by the Union, Progress and Democracy party, the High Court is demanding that Rato and the other executives appear in person.
It also wants former Bank of Spain governor Miguel Angel Fernandez Ordonez to appear as a witness, alongside the partner in auditor Deloitte who was in charge of signing off Bankia's results and the chairman of the Spanish stock market regulator.
INDISCRIMINATE LENDING
The government took over Bankia in May after it became clear the bank could not cope with losses on indiscriminate lending during a property boom that collapsed four years ago.
Rato, who was in a former government of the ruling centre-right People's Party which is now led by Rajoy, was IMF managing director in 2004-2007.
His successor, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, was forced to resign as head of the Washington-based Fund last year and also faces a very different legal investigation in his native France.
Bankia holds more than 10 percent of Spanish deposits and is the biggest bank likely to receive a capital injection when European bailout funds materialise later this year.
Protestors have staged street demonstrations in their thousands, banging pots and pans and blowing whistles outside Bankia branches. Small-scale investors vented their fury at Bankia's new head, Jose Ignacio Goirigolzarri, at a shareholder meeting last week.
Two sources who know the judge assigned to the Bankia case, Fernando Andreu, say he is likely to handle the proceedings aggressively. Andreu is friendly with human rights investigator Baltasar Garzon, best known for ordering the arrest of former Chilean military leader Augusto Pinochet in 1998.
Strauss-Kahn is facing an investigation to establish whether he knew he was dealing with prostitutes and pimps when he attended sex parties in France and the United States.
Public prosecutors have widened the inquiry to include a possible gang rape charge. Strauss-Kahn denies knowing the women at the parties were prostitutes or that there was any violence.
His career at the IMF was cut short when he was arrested in New York in May 2011 on charges, which he denied and that have since been dropped, of attempting to rape a hotel maid.
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