The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Tuesday issued summons to Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut for July 1 after he failed to appear before the agency in an alleged money laundering case of 2018.
The ED rejected Mr. Raut’s exemption request and issued him the summons to record his statement. On June 27, the Member of Parliament had tweeted, “I just came to know that the ED has summoned me. Good! There are big political developments in Maharashtra. We, Balasaheb’s Shivsainiks, are fighting a big battle. This is a conspiracy to stop me. Even if you behead me, I won’t take the Guwahati route. Arrest me! Jai Hind!”
He said he will be in Alibag for meetings and will not be able to appear before the Central agency before July 7 in a case relating to the irregularities in the redevelopment of Patra Chawl project at Goregaon.
The case dates back to March 2018 when an FIR was registered under the provision of prevention of money laundering act against M/s Guru Ashish Construction, Housing Development and Infrastructure Limited (HDIL) promoters Rakesh and Sarang Wadhwan on the basis of a complaint filed by an executive engineer of Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Authority (MHADA). They were charged under sections 409 (criminal breach of trust by public servant, or banker or agent), 420 (cheating and dishonestly inducing delivery of property), 120 B (punishment of criminal conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code.
According to the ED, M/s Guru Ashish Construction was entrusted with the development of Patra chawl project for rehabilitation of 672 tenants on 47 acres of land. During the relevant time, the Wadhawan brothers and Pravin Raut, a Maharashtra-based businessman, were the directors of M/s Guru Ashish Construction.
Under the agreement, the developer was to provide flats to the tenants and also develop flats for MHADA. Thereafter, the remaining area was to be sold by the developer. ED contends the directors of M/s Guru Ashish Constructions misled MHADA and managed to sell the floor space index to nine developers and collected approximately ₹901.79 crore without constructing the rehab portion for 672 displaced tenants and the MHADA portion. The company launched a project named ‘Meadows’ and took the booking amount of around ₹138 crore from flat buyers. The total proceeds of the crime by the company through the illegal activities was approximately ₹1,039.79 crore.
The money trail investigation conducted so far revealed that around ₹100 crore were transferred from HDIL to the account of Pravin Raut. This amount was then diverted to various accounts of his close associates, family members, his business entities etc. It is also revealed that during 2010, a part of the proceeds of crime, amounting to ₹83 lakhs, was received by Mrs Varsha Raut directly/indirectly from Pravin Raut’s wife. An amount of ₹55 lakhs was utilised to purchase a flat at Dadar.
On April 5, the ED had attached immovable properties worth over ₹11 crores belonging to Sena’s Member of Parliament. The assets include eight plots at Kihim beach at Alibaug jointly held by Mrs Varsha, and Swapni, wife of Sujit Patkar, family friend to the Raut family. Also attached are a flat at Dadar that belongs to Mrs Raut and some property at Palghar owned by Pravin Raut, currently in jail.
