Corruption case against judicial officer: ED arrests M3M promoter Basant Bansal, son Pankaj Bansal

ED officials said on the basis of investigation carried and evidences collected so far, both Basant and Pankaj were found guilty of offence of money-laundering as defined under Section 3 of the PMLA and punishable under Section 4 of the PMLA-2002

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) arrested promoter of real estate development company, M3M, Basant Bansal and his son Pankaj Bansal while investigating a money laundering case linked to a corruption case registered against suspended Haryana judicial officer Sudhir Parmar and M3M director Roop Bansal by the Haryana anti-corruption bureau (ACB) at Panchkula in April, said ED officials.

Both Basant and Pankaj were arrested on June 14 evening at ED’s Gurugram zonal office in Rajokri, New Delhi.

Both Basant and Pankaj were arrested on June 14 evening at ED’s Gurugram zonal office in Rajokri, New Delhi, after the Central agency registered an enforcement case information report (ECIR) on June 13 under Sections 3 and 4 of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) for the while, treating the April 17 ACB FIR as a predicate offence. Every PMLA scheduled offence is a predicate offence and the occurrence of the same is a pre-requisite for initiating investigation into the offence of money laundering.

The ACB FIR of April 17 was registered under Sections 7, 8, 11 and 13 of the Prevention of Corruption Act and Section 120-B of the Indian Penal Code against the judicial officer, his nephew Ajay Parmar and M3M director Roop Bansal for offences relating to public servant being bribed, a public servant taking undue advantage without consideration from person concerned in proceedings or business transacted by such public servant, criminal misconduct by a public servant and criminal conspiracy.

Sudhir Parmar, an additional sessions judge rank judicial officer, was presiding over as the CBI and ED judge at Panchkula before he was suspended on April 27 by the Punjab and Haryana high court after being booked by the ACB on April 17. As per the April 17 FIR, Parmar has been accused of alleged favouritism to real estate developers Roop Bansal and his brother Basant Bansal of M3M and Lalit Goyal of IREO Group. The April 17 FIR by the ACB was registered on the basis of “reliable source information”, WhatsApp chats and audio recordings of the accused. According to the FIR, “reliable source-based information” disclosed instances of grave misconduct, abuse of official position and demand/acceptance of undue advantage/bribe from the accused in cases pending in Parmar’s court

As per PMLA probe, Basant, Pankaj guilty of money laundering: ED

The ED officials said on the basis of investigation carried and evidences collected so far, both Basant and Pankaj were found guilty of offence of money-laundering as defined under Section 3 of the PMLA and punishable under Section 4 of the PMLA-2002. “We have collected incriminating evidences such as bank statements and money trail with respect to the allegations in the FIR before making the arrests. Basant Bansal and Pankaj Bansal are key managerial persons of M3M Group,” an ED statement said.

“Basant Bansal and Pankaj Bansal have directly attempted to indulge, knowingly assisted, were knowingly a party and are actually involved in the process or activity connected with the proceeds of crime and projecting it as untainted property,” reads an ED document.

ED officials said both Basant and Pankaj did not co-operate in the investigations, were evasive and withheld information which was within their exclusive knowledge despite being given opportunity to reveal the truth during recording of their statements.

“By their deliberate non-cooperation, Basant and Pankaj have been impeding the investigation. They did not disclose the facts which are in their exclusive knowledge. Thus, they left the ED no other option but to invoke Section 19 (power of arrest) of the PMLA by taking the investigation to a logical conclusion,” said the ED.

The Central agency had on June 8 arrested M3M India director and Basant’s brother Roop Bansal in a separate PMLA case. The PMLA investigations against Roop Bansal were initiated based on multiple FIRs registered against the IREO group. The investigations done by the ED however revealed that a huge amount of money running in hundreds of crores was siphoned off through M3M group also, as per an ED statement.

The Delhi high court on June 9 had granted interim relief (from arrest) to Basant Bansal and his son till July 5 in the IREO matter.