BoB case: ED gets four-day custody to quiz arrested persons

New Delhi: Enforcement Directorate (ED) was Tuesday allowed by a Delhi court to quiz in its custody four persons, including an HDFC bank employee, arrested on alleged money laundering charges in Rs 6,000 crore remittances case at a Bank of Baroda (BoB) branch here.

Accused Kamal Kalra, working with the HDFC Bank's foreign exchange division, Chandan Bhatia, Gurucharan Singh Dhawan and Sanjay Aggarwal were produced before Metropolitan Magistrate Viplav Dabas where ED's special prosecutor N K Matta moved a plea seeking their custodial interrogation for 14 days.

ED said custodial interrogation of these accused, who were arrested today, was required for recovering Rs 6,000 crore of "advance import remittances made through 59 newely opened current accounts without ensuring compliance of banks guidelines/KYC and ascertaining heavy cash receipts made in newely opened current accounts and concealment of proceeds by the accused."

Matta said questioning of these accused was required for ascertaining beneficiary of forex transactions with incorrect exchange rates on many occasions by them and for identifying the other beneficiaries.

ED also said they have to ascertain "the failure of Bank of Baroda to exercise due diligence while making remittances for imports as credit reports of suppliers was not found to have been obtained timely."

"It is apparent from the record brought by investigating officer that the proceeds of crime involved in this case are more than Rs 6,000 crores. It is also clear that detailed interrogation and investigation is required to unearth the complex modus operandi and roots of the syndicate involved in the crime," the court noted in its order.

"Considering the present facts and circumstances, this court deems it fit to remand the accused persons to custody of ED for a period of four days for ascertaining the trail of money as laundered as proceeds of crime, for recovering the huge amount of Rs 6,000 crores as well as to ascertain the involvement of other associates involved in laundering the proceeds of crime," the judge said while sending them to ED's custody till October 17.

ED arrested the four accused today while calling it a case of trade-based money laundering where accused traders evade custom duties and taxes to generate slush funds.

According to ED sources, all the accused were alleged middlemen for at least 15 fake companies, out of the total 59 which were involved in perpetrating the economic crime unearthed recently and also being probed by the CBI.

They have been arrested for the alleged offences under the provision of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).