Some of the persons recently summoned in the Rs263 crore Income-Tax refund fraud case by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) are arrested accused Purshottam Chavan and his Indian Police Services wife’s distant relatives and friends. The names of these summoned persons were in the property documents worth Rs150 crore recovered during a search operation at Chavan’s Colaba residence allocated to his wife.
Sources said that these persons were summoned to understand and examine why these properties and documents related to transfer of development rights (TDR) registered in their names were in Chavan’s possession. The investigation aims to ascertain the true ownership of these assets and their potential links to the fraud.
ED officials said they are conducting a thorough probe but cannot disclose the details. They also confirmed that they have as yet not summoned the IPS officer.
Recently, though, ED officials held marathon questioning of the IPS officer’s staff, including her orderly and driver, at its Ballard Estate office. In their statements, both the driver and the orderly alleged that they collected a huge amount of cash from another accused, businessman Rajesh Batreja, on the instruction of Chavan.
The central agency’s investigation revealed that Batreja and Chavan were in regular touch and shared incriminating messages related to hawala transactions and the diversion of proceeds of crime. The agency has claimed that Chavan tried to hamper the probe by destroying evidence, which could further lead to the tracing of the proceeds of crime. Chavan was produced on Monday in the special court for the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) after his ED custody ended and he was sent to judicial custody. The ED shared its findings with the court, that during the custodial interrogation, Chavan was not cooperating when confronted with various records and documents seized during two raids at his residence.
During the raids, officials found documents for 14 flats located in Mumbai and Thane, including two large flats measuring 3,000 and 1,600 sq ft in Worli. Apart from the property documents, TDR documents for properties in Mumbai and Pune were recovered by the ED, which suspects that these could be benami assets created in the names of these persons.
