Officials from the Enforcement Directorate (ED) filed a Prosecution Complaint (PC) against Lucas Thangmangliana, Nay La Family Exports Pvt Ltd. and 16 others in human hair smuggling cases.
The cases were booked under the provisions of Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) and produced before the Special PMLA Court of Nampally on August 21, 2023. The court took cognizance of the PC on March 1. The ED initiated investigation on the basis of an FIR registered by Hyderabad Police under various sections of IPC against Nay La Family Exports Pvt. Ltd. and others for using benami Import Export Codes (IEC) for exporting human hair, cheating by impersonation, using forged documents and smuggling of human hair to Myanmar, Bangladesh, Vietnam and China from Hyderabad airport and through land routes from Mizoram.
Probe launched by ED revealed that Lucas Thangmangliana, a resident of Mizoram, was arranging illegal border crossing and smuggling of human hair and fertilizer from India to Myanmar through Mizoram border. “He also helped residents of Myanmar in smuggling betel nuts from Myanmar to India and arranged cash payments in respect of above commodities through hawala networks. The modus operandi of payment through hawala network run by Lucas Thanmangliana was such that his associates received payments from the buyers of human hair and fertilizer smuggled from India to Myanmar in Kyat (currency of Myanmar),” explained the officials in a release.
ED had earlier conducted searches at multiple locations in Mizoram and Hyderabad belonging to Lucas Thangmangliana and various shell entities, seized unaccounted cash of ₹1.21 crore and froze more than 100 bank accounts having a balance of ₹7.85 crore. These accounts were used to deposit huge amounts of cash by persons other than the account holders. Human hair exporters from Hyderabad received cash payments from these frozen accounts and through hawala channels as differential payment for their highly undervalued human hair exports. Further investigation is under progress.
