The Enforcement Directorate (ED) investigations revealed that Omkar Realtors and Developers allegedly diverted loans to the tune of Rs 410 crore while cheating another developer over a redevelopment project in Wadala.
The ED arrested Babulal Varma and Kamal Kishore Gupta, promoters of Omkar Group, under the provisions of Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 (PMLA) on Wednesday. Both the accused were produced before the PMLA court, Mumbai on Thursday which sent them to ED custody till January 30.
The anti-money laundering agency initiated investigation on the basis of FIR registered by Aurangabad police, Maharashtra under Section 34, 406 and 420 of Indian Penal Code against promoters of Omkar Group.
According to the FIR, Omkar Realtors and Developers and its directors bought a firm Surana Construction which had SRA rights for redevelopment of Anand Nagar SRA Cooperative Housing Society, Wadala. However, Omkar and its promoters did not pay back the amount due to the seller and also mortgaged future FSI of the said SRA project and took huge amounts of loans.
“Investigation under PMLA revealed that the loans to the tune of ₹410 crores were diverted and not used for intended purposes. No work of SRA building was undertaken,” the agency stated on Thursday. “The requisite rules and procedures under SRA were ignored by the accused and documents relating to names of slum dwellers were forged to claim more FSI for mortgaging the same with banks for taking the loans,” said the ED.
The group has earlier denied allegations of any wrongdoing stating, “We are emphatic that Omkar Group is not in violation of any lending norms and slum approvals.”
ED stated that searches were conducted on January 25 on eleven premises including residential and office premises of key persons. During the search operation, incriminating documents including digital evidences have been found and seized. The accused Varma and Gupta were arrested for their involvement in the offense of money laundering and produced before the PMLA court, Mumbai.
