ED attaches property value over Rs 54 cr of IFFCO MD U S Awasthi underneath money-laundering regulation

Recent property, together with mutual funds, shares, bonds and financial institution deposits valued at greater than Rs 54 crore, belonging to IFFCO Managing Director U S Awasthi have been hooked up in reference to a money-laundering case, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) stated on Wednesday.

The case in opposition to Awasthi, his relations and others is linked to an alleged fertiliser rip-off and cost of kickbacks to the tune of Rs 685 crore.

The federal probe company, in the same motion undertaken in June, had hooked up Awasthi’s properties value Rs 20.96 crore.

In an announcement, the ED stated the “proceeds of crime had travelled from varied entities having enterprise pursuits with IFFCO and an organization referred to as IPL to the entities managed by Rajiv Saxena, which had been projected as fee revenue and the identical had been additional layered and parked in varied entities underneath the management of varied individuals, together with Amol Awasthi (son of Udai Shanker Awasthi), or to those individuals themselves and projected of their palms as real revenue/bills”.

The property, provisionally hooked up underneath the Prevention of Cash Laundering Act (PMLA) on September 22, embody mutual funds, fairness shares, bonds and financial institution balances and are valued at Rs 54.24 crore.

The case pertains to unlawful commissions value greater than Rs 685 crore allegedly given to the NRI sons of IFFCO Managing Director and CEO Awasthi and Indian Potash Restricted (IPL) Managing Director P S Gahlaut in addition to others by abroad suppliers from 2007 to 2014.

Indian Farmers’ Fertiliser Cooperative Restricted (IFFCO) is a multi-state farmers’ cooperative, whereas IPL is its firm concerned in supplying fertilisers for which the federal government gives subsidies to maintain the charges inexpensive for farmers.

The company had earlier hooked up mounted deposits valued at Rs 27.79 crore within the title of Rashtriya Janata Dal’s (RJD) Rajya Sabha MP Amarendra Dhari Singh, deposits of about Rs 36.55 crore stored within the Swiss financial institution accounts of Atrium Holdings Restricted and Inventive Holdings Restricted (each beneficially owned by one other accused within the case, Pankaj Jain), aside from residential and business properties valued at Rs 54.11 lakh belonging to Jain.

The MP was arrested by the company. He later received bail from a court docket.

The ED had filed a chargesheet within the case earlier than a court docket in July final 12 months.

The court docket, the ED stated, held that “all accused individuals knowingly assisted or had been knowingly concerned in acquisition of proceeds of crime and therefore, had been liable to be summoned for the stated offence” and proceeded to difficulty summonses in opposition to them.

The cash-laundering case stems from an FIR lodged by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Could 17, 2021.

The CBI alleged that between 2007 and 2014, in an effort to declare greater subsidies, Awasthi and Gahlaut, as a part of a “prison conspiracy”, imported fertilisers at highly-inflated charges. This included their commissions from varied abroad suppliers.

The fee quantities had been siphoned out of India by their sons primarily based in the US and different accused individuals, together with the house owners of Jyoti Buying and selling Company and the Uncommon Earth Group, Pankaj Jain, who was linked to each firms, his brother Sanjay Jain in addition to Dhari and Rajiv Saxena (an accused within the VVIP choppers deal case), the CBI stated in its FIR.

It added that Saxena and his associates acquired USD 114.32 million (round Rs 685 crore) at a transaction fee of Rs 60 per greenback as unlawful fee within the financial institution accounts of his group firms and within the particular person accounts of Jain, Gahlaut’s son Vivek, Awasthi’s son Amol in addition to the RJD MP.