The Enforcement Directorate has attached assets worth ₹65.75 crore in connection with the money-laundering case against alleged notorious international “hawala” operator, Naresh Jain.
Jain’s syndicate has been accused by the agency of rotating more than ₹96,000 crore in India and also facilitating transfer of about ₹11,800 crore overseas.
The attached assets include residential residential properties, project land and industrial plot located in Delhi, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, which were in the possession of Jain’s brother Bimal, Sunita Jain, Vijay Agrawal and the companies owned or controlled by him.
Some of the companies have been identified as Jayna Infrastructure, Graphic Buildcon, Arrow Buildtech, Season Buildwell and Konark Craft Private Limited.
The ED probe is based on an FIR registered by the Economic Offences Wing of the Delhi police.
According to the agency, Jain, his employees and Binal indulged in forgery and cheating. They used a large number of fake documents like identity proof, birth and education certificates, voter IDs and PAN cards, besides forged signatures, to incorporate hundreds of shell companies in India and abroad.
These companies were used to open and operate bank accounts for facilitating bogus, over-invoiced or under-invoiced import and export transactions, providing the desired accommodation entries to known and unknown beneficiaries by rotating and layering funds, on commission basis. This caused huge losses to the exchequer and banks.
The ED probe has so far detected “proceeds of crime” worth ₹565 crore generated as commission by Jain and his accomplices.
The agency alleged that the “hawala” operations involved routing and re-routing of funds through various processes and activities. “The proceeds of crime have been layered via a complex web of shell entities multiple times to avoid detection and hide the real source,” said the agency.
The funds were projected as income from legitimate sources by introducing them into the financial system in the form of loans, advances and share capital in the companies. Subsequently, they were invested in various properties.
The ED had arrested Naresh Jain in September last year. A chargesheet was then filed against him and others.
