E-Paper
ED attaches multi-crore Punjab irrigation scam kingpin’s assets
The central agency is also looking into the role of government officials and politicians in the case
The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Wednesday attached the assets to the tune of ₹42 crore belonging to contractor Gurinder Singh Bhapa, the alleged kingpin in the multi-crore irrigation scam, who was booked in the case by the Punjab vigilance bureau in 2017.
The ED is also looking into the role of government officials and politicians in the scam, it is learnt.
ED officials said the investigation was underway and other movable and immovable assets of Gurinder are under scrutiny. In 2018, the agency had lodged an ECIR (enforcement case information report) and initiated a probe in the case under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) charges.
As per the VB investigations, irrigation works worth ₹1, 000 crore were awarded to Gurinder through “tailor-made tenders”.
The VB started a probe in April 2017 after the change of government and an FIR was registered four months later. Gurinder was arrested by VB in December that year and he accused ministers and bureaucrats of helping him bag the tenders.
As per the VB, senior irrigation department officials drafted the tenders for contracts of repair of drainages worth over ₹3000 crore from 2012 to 2017 in a way that the terms and conditions suited Gurinder the most.
The names of two former ministers in the then Shiromani Akali Dal-Bharatiya Janata Party (SAD-BJP) government with irrigation portfolio, their personal assistants and three IAS officers had also surfaced.
On July 16 this year, the Punjab and Haryana high court directed the state government to look into the allegations of a “shoddy probe” in the case.
Executive engineers Gulshan Nagpal, Bajrang Lal Singla, chief engineers Paramjit Singh Ghuman, Harvinder Singh and Gurdev Singh Sian were named as co-accused in the case.
