New Delhi: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Thursday filed a supplementary charge sheet against British national Christian Michel, the alleged middleman in the Rs 3,600-crore AugustaWestland VVIP chopper deal case, in which it has mentioned “Mrs Gandhi”, but not named her as an accused in the case, sources said.
Sources confirmed that names of “Mrs Gandhi” and some other Congress leaders are mentioned in the chargesheet, but not as the accused in case. However, it was not clear who “Mrs Gandhi” is and in which context her name was mentioned. It is also learnt that kickbacks were paid separately under different agreements between companies of Christian Michel James, middleman Guido Haschke and AgustaWestland.
The agency has said that kickbacks of Euro 70 million were paid to Air Force official, bureaucrats and important persons of the then ruling political party directly or through middleman who helped Christian Michel and Guido Haschke in influencing the decision of the government. The charge sheet has named Michel’s partner David Syms and his company Global Services Ltd and Global Trading Ltd as accused in the case.
Michel had used the companies as a conduit for receiving money. The ED said that the bribe from Augusta Westland was routed through Global Services and Global Trading. The agency said that further investigation was going on over the role of politicians and bureaucrats involved in the case. Michel was extradited to India on December 4, 2018 from the United Arab Emirates.
