₹70-crore money laundering case: PMLA court allows ED to arrest self-styled godman Ashok Kharat

Special judge RB Rote granted the agency permission to arrest Kharat after he was produced before the court on a production warrant from Nashik Road Central Jail

MUMBAI: A special Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) court on Tuesday allowed the Enforcement Directorate (ED) to arrest self-styled godman Ashok Kharat in connection with an alleged ₹70-crore money laundering and extortion racket linked to the multiple cases of sexual exploitation and fraud registered against him.

₹70-crore money laundering case: PMLA court allows ED to arrest self-styled godman Ashok Kharat

Special judge RB Rote granted the agency permission to arrest Kharat after he was produced before the court on a production warrant from Nashik Road Central Jail. The dubious godman is is judicial custody in connection with rape and cheating cases registered by the Nashik police.

The ED informed the court that Kharat’s custodial interrogation was necessary to trace the proceeds of crime, identify beneficiaries of the alleged money laundering network and investigate a wider conspiracy involving benami accounts and layered financial transactions.

The agency is expected to formally arrest Kharat after completing procedural formalities and produce him before the court on Wednesday to seek his custody remand.

The ED had earlier moved the special court seeking a production warrant for Kharat after registering an Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR) under the PMLA on April 6. The ECIR was based on a Nashik police FIR accusing Kharat of extortion, criminal intimidation, cheating, religious manipulation and drug-facilitated sexual assault of multiple women.

In its plea seeking the production warrant, the ED had told the court that Kharat’s custody was “imperative” to unearth the larger conspiracy, identify the ultimate beneficiaries of the alleged proceeds of crime and trace the money trail, which it suspected could have wider ramifications, including possible cross-border financial links.

According to the ED, preliminary investigation revealed that Kharat and his associates fraudulently induced followers to part with large sums of money by promising miracles, spiritual remedies and solutions to personal problems, and sold common household items such as tamarind seeds and honey as “blessed” or spiritually empowered objects to devotees. Kharat allegedly operated around 60 bank accounts at the Samata Nagari Cooperative Credit Society in Ahilyanagar district, of which 43 were allegedly opened in a single day using documents belonging to followers and victims without their consent. More than ₹70 crore was routed through these accounts, the ED alleged.

Kharat was arrested by the Nashik police on March 18 after a woman devotee accused him of repeatedly raping her over a period of three years under various pretexts. Since then, at least 12 FIRs alleging rape, sexual exploitation, cheating and financial fraud have been registered against him in Nashik and Ahilyanagar districts.

Kharat has denied wrongdoing in the criminal cases lodged against him. His counsel opposed the ED’s plea, contending that he was already in judicial custody and that the agency could interrogate him in jail, without arresting him.

The court, however, allowed the ED’s request to take him into custody.