Mumbai, Feb 15 (IANS): The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Saturday provisionally attached multiple immovable properties, valued at Rs 1.69 crore, in the Jalgaon and Nashik districts of Maharashtra. The ED crackdown on illegal properties came on the back of alleged bank fraud by Jalgaon-based Rajmal Lakhichand Jewelers Private Limited and some other jewellery firms.
These immovable properties were acquired by the promoters of M/s Rajmal Lakhichand Jewelers Private Limited & others in the name of various benami holders.
The investigation agency had filed a chargesheet against three jewellery firms and their promoters in connection with a multi-crore bank fraud case, last year. The company’s promoters and directors were named in the ED chargesheet and charged with defaulting on bank loans, thus leading to significant losses.
It was last year when the Central agency launched an investigation on the basis of three FIRs lodged by the CBI, where the jewellers were accused of criminal conspiracy, cheating, forgery and criminal misconduct.
According to the agency findings, they intentionally defaulted on loans and borrowings from the State Bank of India, thus causing wrongful loss to the tune of Rs 352.49 crore (plus interest thereon) to the State Bank of India.
The ED also recovered some damning documents, which showed that the defaulting jewellers used fake financials to avail loans. They had also engaged in round-tripping of transactions to inflate the financials and booking bogus sale purchase transactions in the books of accounts of the accused companies to siphon off the loan proceeds for investments in real estate properties, in collusion with the company auditors.
“Promoters were also found to have fraudulently sold off parts of mortgaged properties against these loans without the bank’s consent. They also engaged in the destruction of incriminating data concerning the accused companies to prevent any scrutiny of the utilisation of the loan proceeds,” the central agency said in a statement.
In previous search operations, the ED had recovered gold, silver and diamond jewellery/bullion of value Rs 24.36 crore and currency of Rs 1.121 crore in cash along with incriminating documents from the premises of Rajmal Lakhichand group and other firms. Following this, the ED had provisionally attached movable and immovable assets valued at Rs 315.60 crore under the PMLA, 2002 on 13th October 2023.